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ABOUT  MONEY 


AND 


OTHER   THINGS 


a  ®ift-13ook 

BY   THE  AUTHOR   OP 

"JOHN  HALIFAX,  GENTLEMAN" 


NEW    YORK 
HARPER   &  BROTHERS,  FRANKLIN  SQUARE 

1887 


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ABOUT  MONEY  AND  OTHER  THINGS. 

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Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York. 

It^  Sent  by  mail,  postage  prepaid,  to  any  part  of  the  United  Stales  or  Canada,  on  receij4  of  price. 


GIFT 


Z^JJl 


c\SS 


PREFACE. 


I  HAVE  been  often  asked  to  reprint  these 
papers,  by  those  who  believe  the  public  will 
still  listen  to  one  who  even  now  counts  near- 
ly two  generations  of  readers. 

This  little  volume  may  give,  to  a  few 
more,  a  laugh — which  is  good ;  a  tear — 
which  is  sometimes  better ;  a  serious  thought 
or  two — which  is  best  of  all.  Therefore  I 
offer  it  as  a  Christmas  remembrance  from  an 
old  friend,  who  has  lived  for  sixtj^,  and  writ- 
ten books  for  forty  yeara 


Si854165 


CONTENTS. 


Page 

About  Money 1 

Six  Happy  Days .  27 

Life  and  its  Worth 57 

The  Stoky  of  a  Little  Pig 76 

Genius .     .    ^  89 

My  Sister's  Grapes  .     ,     ...     .     .     .    ,     .  109 

On  Sisterhoods.     .     , ;     .     ♦  130 

Facing  the  World    /.....,...  157 

A  Paris  Atelier  ...•,.    ^    .,     ,  183 

Kiss  and  be  Friends     ^    .......  198 


ABOUT  MONEY. 

We  are  apparently  passing  through — let 
us  hope  only  passing  through — a  cycle  of 
very  hard  times.  From  the  large  landowner, 
who  has  to  reduce  his  rents  twenty  or  thirty 
per  cent.,  to  the  dock-laborer,  glad  to  get  a 
charity  breakfast,  price  one  penny,  all  of  us, 
Avorkers  and  non- workers,  are  suffering.  The 
list  of  the  unemployed  extends  through 
every  class,  beginning  with  those  who  are 
the  purveyors  of  luxuries  rather  than  neces- 
saries. The  artist  cannot  sell  his  pictures; 
the  author  finds  publishers  disinclined  for 
new  books;  while,  with  some  striking  ex- 
ceptions, during  the  past  season  concert-  j 
rooms  have  been  painfully  empty,  and  the- 
atres difficult  to  keep  open  except  at  serious 
risk.  Meanwhile,  business  men  say  that 
1 


2  ABOUT   MONEY." 

never  has  trade  been  so  bad  or  its  prospects 
so  gloomy. 

Is  this  only  a  temporary  crisis?  or  a  warii- 
inc:  of  that  decadence  which  comes  to  all  na- 
tions 

"When  wealth  accumulates,  and  men  decay  " — 

the  beginning  of  the  end,  which  is  gradually 
to  make  of  London  a  Nineveh — a  city  of 
desolation?  Who  can  say?  Or  is  it,  as 
some  say,  "  the  struggle  between  labor  and 
capital" — whatsoever  that  may  mean,  and 
to  whatever  it  may  tend  ? 

I  have  lately  been  rereading,  with  una- 
bated admiration,  that  ^vonderful  novel, 
Thackeray's  "  Newcomes,"  and,  closing  it,  I 
was  struck  by  the  fact  that  the  keynote  of 
the  book  is  Money — its  use  and  abuse,  the 
want  of  it,  the  craving  for  it,  the  carelessness 
or  contempt  of  it.  From  the  outset,  when 
the  Newcome  family  originated  by  allying 
itself  to  a  w^ealthy  widow,  to  the  last  chap- 
ter, when  Ethel  uses  Lady  Kew's  hoards  to 
repay  the  not  quite  imaginaiy  wrong  done 


ABOUT  MONEY.  3 

by  her  uncle  to  the  Campaigner — money  is 
at  the  core  of  everything;  the  root  of  all 
evil,  the  source  of  all  good.  Ethel's  pitiful 
voluntary  slavery  to  her  worldly  old  grand- 
mother, her  own  sacrifice  of  Clive,  and  that 
of  Lady  Clara  to  her  brother  Barnes — in 
fact,  the  general  victimization  of  good  peo- 
ple by  bad,  which  is  the  leading  7}iotif  of 
the  stoiy,  all  originate  in  money.  Nay,  the 
dear  old  colonel  himself,  with  his  childish 
carelessness  and  culpable  ignorance  in  the 
matter  of  L.  S.  D.,  is,  in  spite  of  his  virtues, 
really  the  cause  of  half  the  misery  of  the 
book.  He  allows  himself  to  be  fleeced  by 
his  contemptible  broth^^r-in-law ;  he  helps, 
not  honest  folk  only,  but  those  lovable 
prodigals,  F.  Bayham  and  Jack  Belsize ;  he 
tries  to  win  Ethel  for  Clive  by  pecuniary 
chicanery  which  no  honest  son  ought  ever 
to  have  accepted,  and  no  true-hearted  girl 
have  been  influenced  by;  and,  finally,  in 
the  afl'air  of  the  Bundelcund  Bank,  he  reck- 
lessly squanders,  not  only  his  own  property. 


4  ABOUT   MONEY. 

but  that  of  other  people,  whose  ruin  he  most 
assuredly  causes  by  his  innocent  idiocy,  just- 
as  much  as  if  he  had  been  the  greatest  swin- 
dler alive.  Yet  he  is  exalted  into  a  hero — we 
weep  over  him,  and  never  think  of  condemn- 
ing him ;  and  I  know  I  shall  be  considered  the 
most  hard-hearted  wretch  alive  if  I  dare  to 
say  that  I  would  not  for  the  world  have  had 
Colonel  Newcome  as  father,  uncle,  husband, 
or  confidential  friend  !  And  why  ?  Because 
he  was  deficient  in  the  one  point,  the  pivot 
upon  which  society  turns — the  right  use  and 
conscientious  appreciation  of  money. 

In  this  he  is  not  alone.  It  may  seem  an- 
other piece  of  heresy  to  promulgate,  but 
very  few  men  know  how  properly  to  use 
money.  They  can  earn  it,  lavish  it,  hoard 
it,  waste  it;  but  to  deal  with  it  wisely,  as  a 
means  to  an  end,  and  also  as  a  sacred  trust, 
to  be  made  the  best  of  for  others  as  well  as 
themselves,  is  an  education  difficult  of  ac- 
quirement by  the  masculine  mind ;  so  diffi- 
cult that  one  is  led  to  doubt  whether  they 


ABOUT  MONEY.  5 

were  meant  to  acquire  it  at  all,  and  whether 
in  the  just  distribution  of  duties  between 
the  sexes  it  was  not  intended  that  the  man 
should  earn,  the  woman  keep — he  accumu- 
late, and  she  expend ;  especially  as  most 
women  have  by  nature  a  quality  in  which 
men  are  often  fatally  deficient — "  the  infinite 
capacity  for  taking  trouble." 

The  nobler  sex  "can't  be  bothered"  with 
minutiae.  "  What  is  a  paltry  five  pounds  to 
me?"  I  have  heard  said  in  excuse  of  its 
quite  unnecessary  expenditure,  "  when  every 
day  I  have  to  deal  with  hundreds  and  thou- 
sands." Or,  "Why  keep  daily  accounts? 
My  clerks  do  that.  For  me,  I  just  put  two 
or  three  pounds  in  my  pocket,  spend  them 
till  they  are  gone — and  then  put  in  two  or 
three  more."  I  appeal  to  the  candid  mascu- 
line mind  if  this  is  not  the  ordinary  way  of 
thinking,  at  least  of  those  to  whom  ftite  has 
kindly  given  the  "two  or  three  pounds"  al- 
ways in  pocket,  without  need  to  beg,  bor- 
row, or  steal  ? 


Q  ABOUT  MONEY. 

But  this  paper  is  no  criticism  of  the  oppo- 
site sex ;  I  only  wisli  to  say  a  few  words  to 
my  own,  on  a  subject  which,  especially  at 
the  present  crisis,  concerns  them  most  near- 
ly— the  subject  of  money. 

Unsentimental,  unheroic,  some  will  say 
unchristian,  as  it  may  sound,  our  right  or 
wrong  use  of  money  is  the  utmost  test  of 
character,  as  well  as  the  root  of  happiness 
or  misery,  throughout  our  whole  lives.  And 
this  secret  lies  not  so  much  with  men  as 
with  us  women.  Instead  of  strivino;  to  make 
ourselves  their  rivals,  would  it  not  be  wiser 
to  educate  ourselves  into  being  their  help- 
mates ?  Not  merely  as  wives,  but  as  daugh- 
ters, sisters — every  relation  in  which  a  capa- 
ble woman  can  help  a  man,  and  an  incapable 
one  bring  him  to  ruin  ?  Especially  on  that 
particular  point — money. 

I  know  that  I  shall  excite  the  wrath  or 
contempt  of  the  advocates  of  the  higher  edu- 
cation of  women,  when  I  say  that  it  is  not 
necessary  for  every  woman  to  be  an  accom- 


ABOUT  MONEY.  7 

pUsbed  musician,  an  art-student,  a  thor- 
oughly educated  Girton  girl;  but  it  is 
necessary  that  she  should  be  a  woman  of 
business.  From  the  day  when  her  baby 
fingers  begin  to  handle  pence  and  shillings, 
and  her  infant  mind  is  roused  to  laudable 
ambition  by  the  possession  of  the  enormous 
income  of  threepence  a  week,  she  ought  to 
be  taught  the  true  value  and  wise  expendi- 
ture of  money;  to  keep  accounts  and  bal- 
ance them;  to  repay  the  minutest  debt,  or, 
still  better,  to  avoid  incurring  it ;  to  observe 
the  just  proportions  of  having  and  spending, 
and,  above  all^the  golden  rule  for  every  one 
of  us,  whether  our  income  be  sixpence  a  week 
or  twenty  thousand  a  year — waste  notliing. 

May  not  the  growing  disinclination  of  our 
young  men  to  marriage  arise  partly  from 
their  dread,  nay,  conviction — alas,  too  true ! 
— that  so  few  of  our  young  women  have 
been  thus  educated,  and  that  far  from  being 
helpmeets  to  the  men  they  marry,  they  will 
be  an  expense,  a  hinderance,  and  a  continual 


8  ABOUT  MONEY. 

burden?  Without  wishing  to  defend  the 
selfish  young  bachelor  who  waits  till  he  is 
"  in  a  position  to  marry "  which  means  till 
he  has  had  enough  of  the  pleasures  of  free- 
dom, and  finds  them  begin  to  pall — I  have 
often  seen  with  pity  a  young  fellow  who  has 
never  had  occasion  to  think  of  anybody  but 
himself — and  never  has  done  it — learning  by 
hard  experience  the  endless  self-sacrifices  de- 
manded of  a  pater-fiimilias;  good  for  him, 
no  doubt,  but  none  the  less  painful.  Often 
when  going  out  of  London  about  9  a.  ivi., 
and  meetinsr  whole  trainfuls — is  there  such 
a  word  ? — of  busy,  anxious-looking  men  hur- 
lying  into  London,  I  have  said  to  myself, 
"  I  w^onder  how  many  of  these  poor,  hard- 
worked  I'ello^vs  have  waves  or  sisters  or 
daughters  who  really  help  them,  take  the 
weight  of  life  a  little  oflf  their  shoulders,  ex- 
pend their  substance  wisely,  keep  from  them 
domestic  worries,  and,  above  all,  who  take 
care  of  the  money  ?  "  But  for  my  wife  I 
should  have  been  in  the  workhouse,"  is  the 


ABOUT  MONEY,  9 

secret  consciousness  of  many  a  man ;  and  it 
is  a  curious  fact  that  while  many  a  woman 
makes  the  best  of  a  not  too  estimable  hus- 
band, no  power  on  earth  can  save  from  ruin 
a  man  who  has  got  an  unworthy  or  even  a 
foolish  wife.  He  cannot  raise  her,  and  be 
himself  will  gradually 

"Lower  to  her  level  day  by  day, 
What  is  fine  ■within  him  growing  coarse,  to  sympathize  w  ith 
clay." 

Or  even  if  she  means  well,  but  is  by  nature 

or  education  what  I  may  term  "incapable," 

he  finds  himself  saddled  with  not  only  his 

own  share  of  the  life-burden,  but  hers.     The 

more  generous  and  tender-hearted  he  is,  the 

more  he  is  made  a  victim,  both  to  her  and 

to  his  children,  till  he  sinks  into  the  mere 

bread-winner  of  the  family ;    wdio  has  his 

work  to  do,  and  does  it,  through  pride,  or 

duty,  or  love,  or  a  combination  of  all  three, 

usually  without  a  word  of  complaint — does 

it  till  he  drops.     Men  have  a  great  deal  of 

error  to  answer  for,  but  the  silent  endurance 
1* 


10  ABOUT  MONEY. 

of  many  middle-aged  "  family  men,"  to  ^vhom 
— often,  alas !  through  the  wife's  fault — do- 
mestic life  has  been  made  a  burden  rather 
than  a  blessing,  ought  to  be  chronicled  by 
the  Recording  Angel  with  a  tear — not  of 
compassion,  but  admiration — enough  to  blot 
out  many  a  youthful  sin. 

It  is  to  prevent  this — to  try  and  make  of 
our  girls  the  sort  of  wives  that  are  likened 
unto  Lemuel's  mother:  ^'Tlie  heart  of  her 
husband  doth  safely  trust  in  her;  she  will 
do  him  good  and  not  evil  all  the  days  of 
her  life"  —  that  I  would  urs^e  their  beincc 
given,  from  earliest  childhood,  some  knowl- 
edge of  business,  especially  about  money. 
Ten  years  old  is  not  too  soon  to  begin  this, 
or  to  intrust  them  with  the  responsibility  of 
an  income,  however  small,  which  will  prepare 
them  forlarger  responsibilities  in  time  to  come. 

For  I  hold,  as  the  wise  legislators  of  the 
Married  Women's  Property  Act  must  have 
held,  that  every  woman  who  has  any  money 
at  all,  either  earned   or  inherited,  ought  to 


ABOUT  MONEY.  H 

keep  it  in  her  own  hands,  and  learn  to  man- 
age it  herself,  exactly  as  a  man  does.  There 
is  no  earthly  reason  why  she  should  not.  A 
girl  can  learn  arithmetic  just  as  well  as  a 
boy.  Ordinary  business  knowledge  and  busi- 
ness habits  are  just  as  attainable  by  her  as 
by  him.  To  be  able  to  keep  accounts,  to 
write  a  brief,  intelligent  "  business  letter," 
and  to  accustom  herself  to  exactitude  and 
punctuality,  is  as  easy  and  as  valuable  to  a 
girl  in  her  teens  as  to  a  youth  in  an  office  or 
a  young  man  at  college.  Only,  everybody 
expects  it  of  him — nobody  of  her;  and  no- 
body attempts  to  teach  her  how  to  do  it. 

What  is  the  result?  She  enters  life  as  an 
"  unprotected  female,"  neither  forewarned  nor 
forearmed.  "While  single  and  young,  even  if 
deprived  of  father,  uncle,  or  brother,  she  rare- 
ly lacks  some  kindly  male  adviser,  to  wdiom 
she  gives  no  end  of  trouble,  hanging  helpless 
on  his  hands,  and  constantly  asking  him  to 
do  for  her  what  she  oucrht  to  have  learned  to 
do  for  lierself     A  position  interesting,  of 


12  ABOUT  MONEY. 

course,  but  a  trifle  humiliating,  as  well  as  un- 
wise. For,  with  the  best  intentions,  a  man 
gets  tired  of  being  perpetually  "  bothered  " 
by  an  ignorant  and  feeble  woman ;  like  the 
unjust  judge,  he  will  do  anything  to  get  rid 
of  her  and  her  "  much  speaking."  He  gives 
hasty  or  rash  advice;  she  follows,  or  half 
follows  it,  and  sometimes  lives  bitterly  to  re- 
gret that  she  did  so.  Or  else,  trying  to  think 
and  act  for  herself,  and  haviner  neither  knowl- 
edge  nor  capacity  to  do  so,  she  falls  into  irre- 
trievable muddle,  if  not  absolute  ruin. 

What  pitiful  stories  do  we  hear  of  single 
women,  young  or  old,  who  have  lost  their  all 
"throuo^h  too  much  faith  in  man"  —  some 
relative  or  friend,  perhaps  a  knave,  but  more 
commonly  only  a  fool,  to  whom  they  have 
lent  money ;  or  some  trustee  from  whom  they 
have  innocently  received  a  yearly  income, 
never  making  the  slightest  inquiry  as  to 
where  it  came  from,  or  whether  the  invest- 
ments were  safe,  until  some  sudden  col- 
lapse shows  it  to  have  vanished   entirely. 


ABOUT  MONEY.  13 

Such  cases  are  as  endless  as  the  misery  they 
cause.  Yet  hearing  of  them,  one  ahnost  ceases 
to  pity  the  victims,  in  condemning  their  egre- 
gious folly. 

Every  girl  who  is  not  entirely  dependent 
on  her  male  relations — a  position  which,  con- 
sidering all  the  ups  and  downs  of  life,  the 
sooner  she  gets  out  of  the  better — ought,  by 
the  time  she  is  old  enough  to  possess  any 
money,  to  know  exactly  how  much  she  has, 
where  it  is  invested,  and  what  ifc  ought  year- 
ly to  bring  in.  By  this  time  also  she  should 
have  acquired  some  knowledge  of  business : 
bank  business,  referring  to  checks,  dividends, 
and  so  on,  and  as  much  of  ordinary  business 
as  she  can.  To  her,  information  of  a  practical 
kind  never  comes  amiss,  especially  the  three 
golden  rules,  which  have  very  rare  exceptions 
— No  investment  of  over  five  per  cent,  is  really 
safe;  Trust  no  one  with  your  money  without 
security,  which  ought  to  be  as  strict  between 
the  nearest  and  dearest  friends  as  between 
strangers;  and,  lastly.  Keep  all  your  affairs 


14  ABOUT  MONEY. 

from  day  to  clay  in  as  accurate  order  as  if 
you  had  to  die  to-morrow.  The  mention  of 
dying  suggests  another  necessity — as  soon  as 
you  are  twenty-one  years  of  age,  make  your 
will.  You  will  not  die  a  day  the  sooner; 
you  can  alter  it  whenever  you  like;  while 
the  ease  of  mind  it  will  give  to  yourself,  and 
the  trouble  it  may  save  to  those  that  come 
after  you,  are  beyond  telling. 

It  cannot  be  too  strongly  impressed  u])on 
every  girl  who  has  or  expects  that  not  unde- 
sirable thing, "  a  little  income  of  her  own," 
what  a  fortunate  responsibility  this  is,  and 
how  useful  she  may  make  it  to  others.  Hap- 
pier than  the  lot  of  many  married  women  is 
that  of  the  "  unappropriated  blessing,"  as  I 
have  heard  an  old  maid  called,  who  has  her 
money,  less  or  more,  in  her  own  hands,  and 
can  use  it  as  she  chooses,  generously  as  wise- 
ly, without  asking  anybody's  leave,  and  be- 
ino;  accountable  for  it  to  no  one.  But  then 
she  must  have  learned  from  her  youth  up- 
ward how  to  use  it,  she  must  not  spare  any 


ABOUT  MONEY.  15 

amount  of. trouble  in  the  using  of  it,  and  she 
must  console  herself  for  many  a  lonely  re- 
gret— we  are  but  human,  all  of  us ! — with 
the  thou2:ht  that  she  has  been  intrusted  with 
it,  as  a  faithful  steward  of  the  Great  Master. 
Such  an  old  maid  often  does  as  much  good 
in  her  generation  as  twenty  married  women. 
And  if  she  does  marry — what  then  ?  The 
old  notion  was  that  man  being  the  superior 
animal,  when  a  woman  married  she  became 
absorbed  in  her  husband,  and  everything  she 
possessed  was  his,  unless  guarded  from  him 
by  a  cumbrous  machineiy  of  settlements, 
which,  presupposing  him  to  be  a  bad  man, 
were,  if  he  happened  to  be  a  good  one,  rather 
irksome.  Gradually  society  discovered  that 
men  and  women,  though  different,  are  equal, 
and  that  tlierefore  it  was  desirable  to  recog- 
nize their  separate  identity,  and  to  make  mar- 
riage, financially,  a  partnership  with  limited 
liability.  By  I'ecent  laws  a  married  woman 
is,  as  regards  her  property  and  a  good  many 
of  her  rights,  just  as  free  as  if  she  were  single. 


16  ABOUT  MONEY. 

And  no  honest,  honorable  man,  no  wise  and 
tender  husband,  would  wish  it  otherwise.  It 
makes  no  difference  at  all  to  those  who  truly 
love  and  trust  each  other,  w-hile  to  those  who 
do  not  it  is  a  certain  protection  on  botli  sides. 
No  real  union  can  be  affected  by  it ;  while 
in  those  marriao;es  where  the  sentimental  no- 
tion  of  "one  flesh"  is  a  mere  sham,  to  keep 
up  the  pretence  of  union  is  w^orse  than  folly. 
When  the  ship  is  going  down  we  trouble 
ourselves  little  enough  about  the  style  of  the 
cabin  furniture. 

Therefore,  nowadays,  when  a  man  marries 
a  woman  with  money — and  wdiy  should  he 
not,  since  love  is  more  precious  than  gold  ?— ^ 
he  has  only  to  leave  it,  as  the  law  leaves  it, 
entirely  in  her  owai  hands,  thereby  saving 
his  pride,  and  removing  all  questions  as  ta 
his  motive  in  choosins;  her.  That  saddest 
lot  of  a  Avoman  of  property,  to  be  sought  by 
fortune-hunters,  wdiile  honest,  proud  men 
stand  aloof,  is  thus  safely  avoided. 

But  a  step  below  heiresses  are  many  wom- 


ABOUT  MONEY.  I7 

en  who  either  have  or  earn  a  moderate  in- 
come, which  is  an  exceeding  help  to  their 
husbands,  if  the  waives  are  left  free  to  man- 
age and  expend  it,  and  really  know  how  to 
do  so. — That  they  so  seldom  do  know  is  the 
great  curse  of  social  life.  A  single  woman, 
however  incapable,  careless,  extravagant,  can 
only  harm  herself;  a  married  w^oman  can  be 
the  ruin  of  a  whole  family.  Far  more  so 
even  than  a  man,  against  w^hom  a  sensible 
woman  can  sometimes  stand  as  a  barricade, 
counteracting  his  folly — nay,  often  his  erroi's. 
But  a  man  has  no  barricade  a2:ainsthis  wife. 
She  can  drag  him  down  with  her  to  the  very 
depths  of  misery  and  humiliation,  and  he  will 
let  himself  sink — and  sink  silently,  out  of 
either  honor  or  pride,  or  both,  rather  than 
blame  her,  or  let  the  w^orld  see  how  bitterly 
he  blames  himself  for  marrying  her. 

I  can  imagine  nothing  more  pitiable  than 
the  waking -up  of  an  honest,  true-hearted 
young  fellow,  who  finds  his  angel  a  common- 
place, silly,  helpless  woman,  w^hom  he  can 


18  ABOUT  MONEY. 

neither  trust  nor  control,  yet  is  obliged  to 
make  the  nominal  mistress  of  his  household, 
secretly  taking  all  its  burdens  on  himself  in 
addition  to  his  own.  Not  perhaps  that  she 
is  a  bad  woman,  but  simply  an  ignorant  and 
thoughtless  one,  of  the  tribe  of  "  careless  vir- 
gins," who,  as  wives,  are  the  destruction  of 
men.  And  one  of  the  worst  of  women,  not 
being  actually  criminal,  is  she  who  has  no 
sense  of  the  value  and  use  of  money,  which 
when  she  gets  it  "burns  a  hole  in  her  pock- 
et ;"  wdio  never  keeps  accounts,  having  "  no 
head  for  fiixures,"  or  findiner  it  "too  much 
trouble."  Consequently,  even  wnth  the  best 
intentions,  she  wastes  as  much  as  she  spends, 
consoling  herself  on  the  easy  principle  that 
it  doesn't  matter;  Mr.  So-and-So  pays  for 
everything."  As  he  does,  God  help  him ! 
and  chiefly  for  that  one  fuhe  step  which 
made  him  tie  himself  for  life  to  a  charming, 
agreeable,  perhaps  even  lovable,  fool ! 

But  if  she  is  not  a  fool,  and  he  really  can 
trust  her,  he  had  better  do  so,  not  only  with 


ABOUT  MONEY.  19 

lier  own  money,  but  his.  I  do  not  mean 
that  he  should  become  the  proverbially  good 
husband,  whose  wife  every  Monday  morning 
puts  a  sovereign  in  his  jijocket,  "  with  strict 
injunctions  never  to  change  it;"  but  that  he 
sliould  trust  her  with  his  affairs,  and  above 
all  tell  her  exactly  w^hat  income  he  has,  and 
how  he  thinks  it  ought  to  be  spent.  If  she 
is  a  sensible  woman,  the  chances  are  she  will 
spend  it  fiir  more  wisely  and  economically 
than  he  will.  Very  few  men  have  the  time 
or  the  patience  to  make  a  shilling  go  as  fiw 
as  it  can ;  w^omen  have.  Especially  a  wom- 
an whose  one  thought  is  to  save  her  husband 
from  carrying  burdens  greater  than  he  can 
bear;  to  help  him  by  that  quiet  carefulness 
in  money  matters  which  alone  gives  an  easy 
mind  and  a  real  enjoyment  of  life ;  to  take 
care  of  the  pennies,  in  short,  that  he  may 
have  the  pounds  free  for  all  his  lawful  needs, 
and  lawful  pleasures  too. 

Surely  there  can  be  no  sharper  pang  to  a 
lovinoj  wife  than  to  see  her  husband  stasrcf^r- 


20  ABOUT  MONEY. 

ing  under  the  weiglit  of  family  cares ;  worked 
almost  to  deatli  in  order  to  dodi^e  "the  wolf 
at  the  door;"  joyless  in  the  present,  terrified 
at  the  future;  and  yet  all  this  might  have 
been  averted  if  the  wife  had  only  known  the 
value  and  use  of  money,  and  been  able  to 
keep  what  her  husband  earned;  to  "cut  Iier 
coat  according  to  her  cloth,"  for  any  income 
is  "limited"  unless  you  can  teach  yourself  to 
live  within  it;  to  "waste  not,"  and  therefore 
to  "  want  not." 

But  this  is  not  always  the  woman's  fault. 
Many  men  insist  blindly  on  a  style  of  living 
which  their  means  will  not  allow ;  and  many 
a  wife  has  been  cruelly  blamed  for  living  at 
a  rate  of  expenditure  unwarranted  by  her 
husband's  means,  and  which  his  pecuniary 
condition  made  absolutely  dishonest,  had  she 
known  it.  But  she  did  not  know  it;  he 
being  too  careless  or  too  cowardly  to  tell  her, 
and  she  not  havins:  the  sense  or  courao-e  to 
inquire  or  to  find  out.  Every  mistress  of  a 
household — especially  every  mother — oncjlit 


ABOUT  MONEY.  21 

to  find  out  how  much  the  money  is,  and 
where  it  comes  from;  and  thereby  prevent 
all  needless  extra vacjance.  Half  the  miser- 
able  or  disgraceful  bankruptcies  that  happen 
never  would  happen  if  the  wives  had  stood 
firm,  and  insisted  on  knowing  enough  about 
the  family  income  to  be  able  to  expend  it  pro- 
portionately; to  restrain,  as  every  wife  should, 
a  too-lavish  husband  ;  or,  failing  that,  to  stop 
herself  out  of  all  luxuries  which  she  cannot 
righteously  afford.  Above  all,  to  teach  her 
children  a  tender  carefulness  that  refuses  to 
mulct  "the  governor  "  out  of  one  unnecessary 
halfpenny,  or  to  waste  the  money  he  works  so 
hard  for  in  their  own  thoun^htless  amusements. 
If  the  past  genei'ation  was  too  severe  upon 
its  offspring,  and  often  killed  off  the  weakest 
of  them  by  a  mistaken  system  of  "harden- 
ing," the  present  one  errs  in  an  opposite  di- 
rection. Pater-familias,  whose  father  put  him 
in  an  oflSce  at  sixteen,  and  kej^t  him  there 
with  only  a  fortnight's  holiday  per  annum, 
now  sends  his  boys  to  school  till  eighteen. 


22  ABOUT  MONEY. 

and  then  to  college;  gives  them  ^^achting, 
cricketing,  walking  tours,  and  Continental 
travels;  denies  nothing  to  either  them  or 
their  sisters,  but  works  for  them  till  he 
drops;  and  then — where  are  they? 

It  is  to  prevent  this — to  counteract  the 
creed  of  feminine  subservience  and  blind 
obedience,  to  make  the  woman  man's  help 
and  not  his  hinderance — that  I  would  have 
our  girls  taught  to  claim  their  real  "rights" 
and  exercise  their  best  "  female  franchise  " — 
freedom  to  stand  on  their  own  feet,  and,  be 
they  single  or  married,  to  take  their  aflfairs 
into  their  own  hands,  especially  their  finan- 
cial affairs.  A  person  who  is  careless  about 
money  is  careless  about  everything,  and  un- 
trustworthy in  everything.  It  is  your  de- 
spised prudent  folk  to  whom  the  rashly  gen- 
erous, indifferent,  and  thoughtless  come  in 
the  end  for  all  th^it  makes  life  worth  having, 
and  plead:  "Give  us  of  your  oil,  for  our 
lamps  are  gone  out."  But  why  were  they 
allowed  to  go  out? 


ABOUT  MONEY.  23 

Yet  there  is  such  a  tliin^:  as  iornoble  econo- 
my,  as  well  as  noble  extravagance.  She  who 
stints  her  servants  in  wages  and  food ;  who 
goes  shabbily  clad  when  her  station  and  her 
means  require  her  to  please  the  world  and 
her  family  by  being  dressed  at  all  points 
like  a  lady;  who  worries  herself  and  her 
friends  by  trying  always  to  save  when  she 
can  w^ell  afford  to  spend,  is  deserving  of  the 
severest  blame.  Money  is  meant  not  for 
hoarding,  but  for  using;  the  aim  of  life 
should  be  to  use  it  in  the  right  way — to 
spend  as  much  as  we  can  lawfully  spend, 
both  upon  ourselves  and  others.  And  some- 
times it  is  better  to  do  this  in  our  lifetime, 
when  we  can  see  that  it  is  well  spent,  than 
to  leave  it  to  the  chance  spending  of  those 
that  come  after  us.  Above  all,  let  us  guard 
against  the  two  crying  errors  of  the  female 
nature — a  prudence  which  degenerates  into 
mere  "  worrying,"  and  an  economy  which  be- 
comes culpable  narrowness. 

To  teach  the  girls  of  the  generation — alas! 


24  ABOUT  MONEY. 

the  gl•o^vn  women  are  beyond  teaching ! — I 
liave  written  these  pages,  trying  to  put  the 
question  of  money  in  its  true  light;  tliat  it 
is  not  the  root  of  all  evil  (unless  planted  by 
evil  hands),  but,  wisely  dealt  with,  the  source 
of  all  good — at  least,  the  helper  in  all  good  ; 
bringing,  when  rightly  used,  an  easy  mind, 
a  quiet  conscience,  the  power  of  benefiting 
others,  and,  at  any  rate,  of  saving  one's  self 
from  being  a  burden  to  others. 

To  be  able  to  earn  money,  or,  failing  that, 
to  know  how  to  keep  it,  and  to  use  it  wisely 
and  well,  is  one  of  the  greatest  blessings  that 
can  happen  to  any  woman,  as  well  as  to  the 
man,  be  he  fother,  brother,  or  husband,  with 
whom  her  lot  may  be  cast.  Single  or  mar- 
I'ied,  she  will  always  have  the  power  in  her 
hands — that  divinest  power  a  woman  can 
possess  —  to  make  those  about  her  happy. 
Her  husband,  if  she  has  one,  will  be  "  praised 
in  the  gates,"  for  he  is  saved  half  the  troubles 
and  humiliations  of  other  men.  He  never 
wants   money,  or   has   to  work  himself  to 


ABOUT  MONEY.  25 

death  to  earn  it,  for  whatever  he  earns  she 
keeps  and  makes  the  best  of.  Be  their  in- 
come large  or  small,  she  has  the  strength 
and  self  denial  to  limit  their  expenses  accord- 
ingly. She  never  shrinks  from  saying  to 
every  member  of  her  family — husband  in- 
cluded— and  to  the  world  outside  as  well — 
"We  cannot  afford  it."  Therefore  that  hor- 
rible incubus  of  "  keeping  up  appearances  " 
is  forever  removed  both  from  her  and  from 
him.  The  ideal  household  is  that  wdiich  is 
exactly  what  it  seems. 

And  for  the  woman  that  has  no  husband 
— no  one  either  to  help  her  or  control  her — 
well,  the  advantages  and  disadvantages  often 
balance  each  other.  She  can  do  as  she  likes 
with  her  own  ;  if  she  has  no  sympathizer,  at 
least  she  has  no  hinderer,  either  in  her  pleas- 
ures or  her  duties — most  of  all  in  her  chari- 
ties. Her  money,  which  otherwise  might 
have  been  only  a  pang,  can  thus  be  made 
into  a  blessing.  And  if  she  must  go  down  to 
the  grave  alone — what  woman  is  ever  quite 
2 


26  ABOUT  MONEY. 

alone  who  Las  the  will  and  the  power  to  do 
good  wherever  she  goes?  whose  strength  is 
in'  herself,  and  whose  aim  it  is  to  die  as  she 
has  lived — a  help  to  all  and  a  trouble  to  no 

one  ? 


SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT. 

I  HAD  long  heard  of  the  house-boat,  and 
had  once  seen  it.  It  lies,  summer  after  sum- 
mer, moored  in  a  tiny  bay  on  our  river 
Thames;  and  twice  it  had  been  offered  to 
me  for  a  week's  occupation  by  its  kindly 
owner,  but  I  never  was  able  to  go.  When 
at  last  I  found  I  could  go,  I  was  as  ready  to 
"jump  for  joy"  —  had  that  feat  been  possi- 
ble— as  any  of  you  young  people. 

To  live  in  a  house-boat  on  the  broad  riv- 
er, with  a  safe  barricade  of  water  betw^een 
yoji  and  the  outside  world  —  to  fish  out  of 
your  parlor  door,  and,  if  you  wanted  to 
wash  your  hands,  to  let  dow^n  jugs  with  a 
string  from  your  bedroom  window;  more- 
over, to  enjoy  unlimited  sunrises  and  sun- 
sets, to  sleep  w  ith  the  "  lap-lap  "  of  a  flowing 


28  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

stream  in  your  ears,  to  waken  with  the  songs 
of  birds  from  the  trees  of  the  shore  —  what 
could  be  more  delightful  ?  Nothing,  except 
perhaps  "camping  out"  under  the  stars, 
which  might  also  be  a  trifle  damp  and  un- 
comfortable. 

But  there  was  no  dampness  here.  And 
there  was  more  than  comfort — actual  beauty. 
When  I  went  down  to  look  at  it,  in  early 
spring,  and  the  kind  owner  showed  it  with 
pride — pardonable  pride — I  found  the  house- 
boat adorned  w^ith  Walter  Crane's  drawinojs 
and  William  Morris's  furniture;  most  aes- 
thetic in  its  decorations,  and  as  convenient 
as  a  well-appointed  yacht.  Also,  there  was 
a  feeling  about  it  as  if  the  possessor  loved 
it,  and  loved  to  make  people  happy  in  it. 
Mottoes  from  Shakespeare,  Shelley,  Keats, 
Milton,  were  in  every  room,  and  tiny  pict- 
ures outside  —  a  gallery  of  ever -changing 
loveliness. 

I  came  home  full  of  enthusiasm,  and  im- 
mediately set  about  choosing  "a  lot  of  girls," 


IN  A  HOUSEBOAT.  29 

as  many  as  the  boat  would  Lokl,  to  share  it 
with  me.  Only  girls ;  any  elderly  person, 
except  the  inevitable  one,  myself,  would,  we 
agreed,  have  spoiled  all.  I  did  not  choose 
my  girls  for  outside  qualities,  though  some 
of  them  were  pretty  enough  too  —  but  for 
good-temper,  good-sense,  and  a  cheerful  spir- 
it; determined  to  make  the  best  of  every- 
thing, and  fiice  the  worst  —  if  necessary. 
These  were  the  qualities  I  looked  for — and 
found. 

I  shall  not  paint  their  portraits  nor  tell 
their  names,  except  to  mention  the  curious 
fact  that  three  out  of  the  six  were  Kather- 
ines.  We  had,  therefore,  to  distinguish  them 
as  Kitty,  Kath,  and  Katie,  the  latter  being 
our  little  maid-ofall-work — our  coachman's 
daughter.  The  other  three  were  our  young 
artist,  whose  name  is  public  property,  and 
two  others,  neither  literary  nor  artistic — but, 
for  reasons  needless  to  explain,  specially  my 
girls  —  whom  I  shall  accordingly  designate 
as  Meum  and  Tuum.     All  were  between  fif 


80  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

teen  and  twenty-five  —  l^appy  age!  and  all 
still  walked  "in  maiden  meditation  fimcj 
free,"  so  we  had  not  a  man  among  us ! — ex- 
cept our  sole  protector,  Katie's  father,  whom 
I  shall  call  Adam,  after  Shakespeare's  Adam 
in  "  As  You  Like  It,"  whom  he  resembles  in 
everything  but  age. 

Six  girls  afloat!  And  very  much  afloat 
they  were,  swimming  like  ducks — no,  let  us 
say  swans — on  a  sea  of  sunshiny  felicity.  As 
we  drove  from  our  last  railway  station — 
Maidenhead — our  open  omnibus,  filled  with 
bright-fiiced  damsels,  seemed  quite  to  inter- 
est the  inhabitants.  Reaching  the  open 
country,  that  lovely  Thames  valley  which 
all  English  artists  know,  our  ringing  laugh- 
ter at  every  small  joke  startled  the  still  July 
afternoon,  and  made  the  birds  dart  quickly 
out  of  the  hedgerows.  Such  hedgerows  they 
were !  full  of  wild  roses,  pink  and  deep  red, 
honeysuckle,  traveller's  joy,  and  countless 
other  flowers. 

"  There  it  is  !     There  is  the  house-boat !" 


IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT.  31 

cried  Kitty,  who  had  seen  it  before,  having 
been  with  me  when  we  investisrated  it  do- 
mestically  a  few  weeks  before. 

"  Hurrah  !  w^e  have  nearly  reached  it — 
our  'appy  'ome,"  exclaimed  Meum  and  Tu- 
um,  standing  up  in  the  carriage  together. 
Two  of  the  Katherines  followed  their  exam- 
ple ;  indeed,  w^e  must  have  looked  a  most  ill- 
behaved  party,  only,  fortunately,  there  was 
no  one  to  see  us,  except  one  laborer  lazily 
sitting  on  a  mowing-machine  which  was 
slowly  cutting  down  all  the  pride  of  the 
flowery  meadow  through  which  we  drove  to 
the  river- side. 

There  she  lay,  the  Pinafore^  and  beside 
her  the  Bih^  a  little  boat,  w^hich  w^as  to  be 
our  sole  link  between  the  Pinafore  and  the 
outside  world.  In  it  sat  the  owner,  w^ho  had 
patiently  awaited  us  there  two  hours,  and 
w^hose  portrait  I  should  like  to  paint,  if  only 
to  show  you  a  bachelor  —  an  old  bachelor 
you  girls  would  call  him — who  has  neither 
grown  selfish  nor  cynical,  who  knows  how  to 


32  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

use  bis  money  without  abusing  it,  and  who 
does  use  a  good  part  of  it  in  making  other 
people  happy. 

The  Pinafore  is  his  hobby.  He  built  it 
on  the  top  of  a  barge,  under  his  own  direc- 
tions, and  from  his  own  design.  It  consists 
of  a  saloon  at  one  end,  combination  kitchen 
and  dining-room  at  the  other,  and  four  cab- 
ins between,  with  two  berths  in  each.  A 
real  little  house,  and  well  mi2:ht  we  call  it 
our  happy  home — for  six  days. 

Our  host  showed  us  all  over  it  once  more, 
pointed  out  every  possible  arrangement  for 
our  comfort,  partook  of  a  hasty  cup  of  tea, 
and  then  drove  back  in  our  empty  omnibus 
Londonwards,  deeply  commiserated  by  us 
whom  he  left  behind  in  his  little  Paradise. 

The  first  meal!  Its  liveliness  was  only 
equalled  by  the  celerity  with  which  it  was 
despatched,  for  we  were  frightfully  —  no, 
wholesomely — hungry.  And  then  came  sev- 
eral important  questions. 

"  Business  before  pleasure !     Choose  your 


IN  A  HOUSEBOAT.  33 

room-mates,  girls,  and  then  arrange  your 
rooms.  It  is  the  fashion  on  board  the  Pin- 
afore to  do  everything  for  yourselves.  When 
all  is  ready  we  will  take  a  row  in  the  sun- 
set, and  then  come  back  to  bed." 

Which  would  have  been  a  pleasant  busi- 
ness if  some  of  them  had  had  to  sleep  in 
beds  of  their  own  making  ! 

"  Ma'am,"  said  Katie,  who  was  beside  me 
when  I  peeped  into  one  cabin,  which  was 
one  confused  heap  of  mattresses,  blankets, 
pillows,  and  sheets,  "hadn't  I  better  do  the 
rooms  myself?  The  young  ladies  don't  quite 
understand  the  way  of  it." 

Katie,  the  best  of  little  housemaids,  was 
heartily  thanked,  and  her  offer  accepted. 
"  But,  girls,  remember  it  is  for  the  first  and 
last  time.  After  to-night  you  must  learn  to 
do  your  rooms  yourselves." 

So  we  threw  overboard  the  practical  for 
the  poetical,  and,  like  Hiawatha,  went  sail- 
ing towards  the  sunset  in  dreamy  delight. 

What  a  sunset  it  was!  The  river,  with 
2* 


34  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

its  flowery  banks,  rushy  islands,  and  tree- 
fringed  back-waters,  was  dyed  all  colors,  ac- 
cording to  the  changing  color  of  the  sky. 
Such  green  mounds  of  trees,  dark  woods  on 
either  side !  everything  full  of  rich  summer 
life,  from  the  stately  pair  of  swans  sailing 
about,  wnth  their  six  gray  cygnets  after 
them,  to  the  w^ater-hen  scuttling  among  the 
reeds,  the  willow -wren  singing  among  the 
bushes,  and  the  wary  rat  darting  into  his  hole 
as  we  passed.     All  was  beauty  and  peace. 

"The  cares  that  infest  the  day 
Did  fold  their  tents,  like  the  Arabs, 
And  silently  steal  away." 

My  five  girls  could  all  handle  an  oar,  and 
how  they  did  enjoy  their  row!  The  two 
youngest  took  it  by  turns,  and  at  least  suc- 
ceeded in  "catchino;  crabs"  with  much  dex- 
terity  and  hilarity. 

On  and  on,  till  w^e  were  stopped  by  a  lock 
— the  three  evils  of  the  Thames  are  locks, 
weirs,  and  lashers.  So  we  turned,  and  let 
ourselves  drift  back  with  the  current.    Now 


IN  A  HOUSE  BOAT.  35 

and  then  we  "  hugged  "  the  bank,  and  gath- 
ered thence  a  huge  handful  of  purple  loose- 
strife, blue  and  white  bugloss,  meadow-sweet, 
and  forget-me-not;  or  we  floated  over  great 
beds  of  water-lilies,  yellow  or  white,  which 
grew  on  a  quiet  little  back-water,  where  we 
nearly  got  stranded  in  a  shoal  and  pierced 
with  a  snag.  But  "  a  miss  is  as  good  as  a 
mile,"  said  we,  and  were  more  careful  another 
time. 

The  sun  had  long  set,  and  the  moon  was 
setting — the  young  moon,  like  a  silver  boat 
— when  we  re-entered  our  "happy  home"  for 
supper  and  bed ;  the  second  speedily  follow- 
ing the  first  for  various  excellent  reasons, 
one  being  that  the  supper-table  was  required 
•for  Adam's  couch.  We  gave  him  his  choice 
whether  to  sleep  on  it  or  under  it,  and  he 
preferred  the  latter,  as  being  "  more  like  a 
four-poster."  Adam  is  by  nature  almost  as 
silent  as  his  horses,  but  his  few  remarks — 
terse,  dry,  and  shrewd — often  pass  into  fam- 
ily pi'ovei'bs. 


36  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

So  all  the  Pinaforeh  crew  sank  into  re- 
pose, except  one,  who  has  an  occasional  bad 
habit  of  lying  awake  "  till  the  day  breaks 
and  the  shadows  flee  away."  How  glorious- 
ly it  did  break,  that  dawn  on  the  Thames  ! 
and  how  strange  were  the  river  sounds — tlie 
chirping  of  birds  and  the  lowing  of  cattle 
mingling  with  other  mysterious  noises,  after- 
wards discovered  to  be  the  tapping  of  swans' 
beaks  against  the  barge,  and  the  clatter  of 
the  water-rats  careering  about  underneath  it. 
Nevertheless  at  last  sleep  came,  and  with  it 
the  power  to  face  and  enjoy  another  new  day. 

A  holiday  is  never  the  worse  when  there 
runs  through  it  a  stratum — a  very  thin  stra- 
tum— of  work.  So  the  two  working -bees, 
author  and  artist,  decided  to  be  put  ashore 
after  breakfast  and  left  under  two  trees,  with 
their  several  tasks,  while  the  others  enjoyed 
themselves,  till  dinner-time,  when  we  ex- 
pected friends  who  were  to  row  about  ten 
miles  to  spend  the  day  with  us. 

Dinner  reminds  me  of  our  domestic  com- 


IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT.  37 

missariat — ^vLich,  considering  th:ifc  food  for 
eight  or  ten  hungry  people  does  not  grow  on 
every  bush,  was  important.  Groceries  and 
other  stores  we  brought  with  us,  but  bread, 
milk,  butter,  fruit,  and  vegetables,  we  had  to 
get  from  the  inn  opposite,  which  also  sent  us 
our  meat  ready-cooked,  it  being  impossible  to 
roast  a  joint  on  board  the  Pivxxfore,  Fresh 
water,  too,  we  had  to  get  from  the  inn  pump, 
river  water  not  being  wholesome  for  drink- 
ing. Great  fun  were  those  voyages  to  and 
fro,  for  we  were  all  thirsty  souls,  and  all,  even 
Adam,  teetotallers.  The  amount  of  water 
and  milk  we  got  through  was  such  that  some 
one  suggested  it  would  save  trouble  to  fetch 
the  cow  on  board. 

The  kindly  landlady  bade  us  "  gather  our 
fruit  for  ourselves,"  so  we  often  brought  home 
a  boat-load  of  valuable  food — potatoes,  pease, 
crisp  lettuces  pulled  up  by  the  roots  and 
eaten  as  rabbits  eat  them ;  also  raspberries, 
cherries,  and  currants.  It  was  almost  as  good 
as  shooting  or  fishing  one's  dinnei*.      And, 


38  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

presently,  the  siglit  of  tbe  fish  jumping  up 
round  the  boat  bronsrht  a  sad  look  to 
Adam's  amiable  countenance. 

"  If  I  had  but  a  rod  and  line,  ma'am,  I'd 
catch  them  for  dinner." 

And  very  nasty  they  might  have  been — 
river  fish  generally  are — yet  politeness  would 
have  obliged  us  to  eat  them,  so  perhaps  it 
was  all  for  the  best  that  we  had  no  materials 
for  the  piscatory  art.  Adam  could  but  watch 
the  poor  little  fishes  swimming  innocently 
about,  and  sigh  that  fate  prevented  him  from 
catching  them. 

After  a  mirthful  day  our  guests  departed, 
and,  to  rest  their  arms,  my  ^ve  girls  decided 
to  stretch  their  legs  and  take  a  walk  on 
shore.  "Let's  have  a  race," said  the  biggest 
and  the  most  beautiful.  As  she  tucked  up 
her  skirts  she  looked  a  real  Atalanta.  The 
second  in  height,  and  only  a  trifle  less  in  grace 
and  activity,  did  the  same,  and  off  they  started, 
up  what  seemed  a  solitary  road,  when  lo !  sud- 
denly appeared  two  young  Oxford  men,  book 


IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT.  39 

in  hand !  What  they  thought  of  the  appari- 
tion of  these  two  fair  athletes,  and  the  three 
other  girls  behind,  all  of  whom  collapsed 
suddenly  into  decorum,  will  never  be  known. 
But  I  doubt  if  they  read  much  for  the  next 
ten  minutes. 

The  race  thus  stopped,  we  thought  we 
would  go  into  the  village  churchyard,  where 
two  old  men  were  soberly  making  hay  of  the 
grass  cut  over  the  graves.  Thence  we  passed 
into  a  quiet  wood,  and  finally  came  home — 
hungry,  as  usual — to  supper. 

And  so  concluded  our  second  day. 

No,  not  concluded.  About  eleven  p.  m. 
there  happened  a  most  dramatic  incident. 
A  sudden  and  violent  bump  caused  the  Pin- 
afore to  shake  from  stem  to  stern.  We  all 
woke  up.  Some  declared  they  heard  a  voice 
exclaim,  "  Hallo,  Bill !  where  are  you  going 
to  V  and  others  vowed  tliere  was  a  mysteri- 
ous rattlins:  at  what  w^e  entitled  our  "  front 
door."  Adam  was  vehemently  called,  and  he 
and  his  mistress,  in  rather  hasty  toilets,  care- 


40  SIX  HAPPY   DAYS 

fully  examined  every  corner;  but  all  was 
safe.  Then  we  looked  out,  in  case  there  had 
been  an  accident,  but  nothing  could  be  seen. 
The  river  flowed  on,  empty,  dark,  and  still. 

Quiet  being  a  little  restored,  I  entered  the 
cabin,  where  five  maidens,  all  in  nocturnal 
white,  stood  congregated  together,  in  a  group 
not  unlike  the  daughters  of  Niobe,  and  took 
their  evidence.  However,  as  the  mystery, 
whatever  it  was,  could  not  be  solved,  we  all 
went  to  bed.  And  Adam,  having,  with  his 
usual  cautious  fidelity,  poked  into  every  place 
that  a  thief,  or  even  a  fly,  could  enter,  made 
the  brief  remark, "  Pirates,"  and  retired  again 
to  his — table. 

The  only  result  of  this  remarkable  episode 
was  that  about  eisjht  the  next  mornins:,  find- 
ins:  a  solemn  silence  in  the  cabins  instead  of 
the  usual  tremendous  chatter,!  went  to  look 
at  my  girls,  and  found  them  all  ^ve  lying  fast 
asleep,  "like  tops."  As  it  was  a  pelting  wet 
mornino:,  with  the  wind  blowini^  after  a  fash- 
ion  which  required  all  one's  imagination  to 


IN  A  HOUSEBOAT.  41 

make  believe  that  our  dwelling  was  quite 
steady,  this  infringement  of  my  Mede-and- Per- 
sian rule — eioflit  o'clock  breakfast — was  less 
important.  But  I  said,  remorselessly,  "My 
dears,  this  must  never  happen  again."  Nor 
did  it. 

Their  laziness  lost  my  girls  the  great  ex- 
citement of  the  day.  A  sudden  outcry  from 
Adam  of"  The  boat !  the  boat !"  revealed  the 
alarming  sight  of  our  little  Bih  having  got 
unmoored,  drifting  away  calmly  at  her  own 
sweet  will  down  stream !  For  a  moment 
Adam  looked  as  if  he  intended  to  swim  after 
her,  then  changed  his  mind  and  halloaed  with 
all  his  strength.  Female  voices  despairingly 
joined  the  chorus ;  for  at  this  hour,  and  on 
such  a  wet  morning,  there  was  not  a  soul  to 
be  seen  at  the  hotel  garden  or  the  ferry. 
What  Avould  become  of  us,  moored  helplessly 
a  good  distance  from  the  shore,  and  our  boat 
away?  A  last  agonizing  shout  we  made,  and 
then  saw  a  man  rush  out,  evidently  thinking 
somebody  w^as  drowning.      He  caught  the 


42  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

position  —  and  the  boat,  wliicli  in  another 
minute  or  two  would  have  drifted  past  the 
little  pier,  jumped  into  her,  and  brought  her 
back  to  us  in  triumph. 

After  this  we  settled  down,  thankful  that 
things  were  no  worse — thou2;h  there  bec^an 
a  dreary  downpour  and  a  wind  that  rattled 
every  door  and  window  of  our  frail  dwelling. 
The  girls'  countenances  fell. 

Now,  though  the  happiest  days  of  my  life 
are  spent  among  young  people,  I  have  ahvays 
found  that  a  certain  amount  of  law  and  or- 
der is  as  good  for  them  as  for  myself,  else  we 
get  demoralized.  So  instead  of  mournfully 
hancrinQ:  about  wonderins^  when  it  would 
clear  up,  and  what  we  should  do  if  it  didn't 
clear  up,  I  set  everybody  to  do  something. 
Two  cleaned  the  bedrooms  and  exulted  over 
the  dust  they  swept  away,  another  wrote 
home  letters,  and  a  fourth  gave  us  delightful 
music  on  the  harmonium.  The  artist  had,  of 
course,  her  own  proper  work,  which  filled  her 
whole  morning.     And  when  about  noon  the 


IN  A  HOUSE  BOAT.  43 

sky  cleared,  and  grew  into  a  lovely  July  day, 
breezy  and  bright,  with  white  clouds  careering 
about,  we  felt  we  had  really  earned  our  felicity. 

Still  it  was  too  stormy  to  row  much,  so  we 
landed,  and  investigated  the  shore  on  either 
side.  First  the  Abbey, beside  which  was  the 
hotel  and  its  farmyard,  splendid  haystacks 
almost  touching  the  ancient  ruins,  which  date 
from  the  time  of  King  John.  Then,  after  the 
important  interval  of  tea,  came  a  long  walk 
on  the  opposite  bank,  where,  protected  from 
the  wind  by  three  umbrellas,  the  party  sat 
admiring  the  scene,  and  themselves  making  a 
charming  picture, nc^^  painted  at  present.  And 
lastly,  as  if  to  reward  our  cheerful  patience, 
after  sunset  the  wind  sank,  and  lo !  high  up 
in  the  clear  west,  in  the  midst  of  a  brilliant 
sunset,  sat  the  crescent  moon. 

"  We  must  have  another  row !"  And  so 
we  had,  until  twilight  melted  into  dark,  and, 
quite  tired  out,  we  went  to  bed  content. 

The  third  morning  came,  and  by  eight 
o'clock  the   house-boat  was  as  noisy   as  a 


44  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

magpie's  nest.  We  bad  arranged  for  a  long 
expedition,  with  a  boatman  who  knew  each 
lock,  weir,  lasher — every  danger  on  the  livei*. 
Leaving  to  him  all  the  care  of  the  voyage, 
we  determined  to  enjoy  ourselves  thoroughly. 
Our  morning  row  was  delightful,  but  brief, 
since  the  girls  and  the  boat  had  to  sit  for 
their  portraits,  the  young  artist  afterwards 
putting  in  herself — from  memory — sitting  at 
the  bow.  But  w^e  had  scarcely  reached  home 
wdaen  down  came  the  rain  in  torrents.  I  had 
w^arned  my  girls  of  this,  having  read  in  the 
Times  that  a  "depression"  w^as  travelling 
over  from  America  —  all  our  bad  w^eather 
does  come  from  America — but  of  course  they 
didn't  believe  it.  Even  now,  though  the  sky 
was  a  leaden  gray,  and  the  river  too,  bub- 
blins:  all  over  with  the  sheets  of  rain  which 
pelted  on  our  flat  roof;  though  our  "front 
garden  "  and  "  back  garden  " — as  we  called 
the  spaces  at  the  two  ends  of  the  bai'ge — 
were  soaking  with  w^et,  my  five  girls  would 
hardly  believe  in  their  hard  lot. 


IN  A  HOUSEBOAT.  45 

"  It  musfc,  it  will  clear !"  persisted  they ; 
but  it  did  not  clear — for  six  mortal  hours. 

We  soon  ceased  to  lament,  and  rejoiced 
that  we  were  safe  under  cover.  We  made 
the  best  of  our  afternoon^ — we  read,  we  drew, 
we  played  games;  then  we  took  to  music, 
and  sang  or  tried  to  sing,  some  catches  and 
rounds.  Finally  our  eldest  girl  gave  us 
Mendelssohn  on  the  little  harmonium,  and 
our  youngest,  in  her  clear,  fresh,  pathetic 
voice,  sans:  us  Schubert's  sonsrs  from  Wilhelin 
Meistei%  till  a  boat-load  of  soaked,  white- 
jacketed  youths  was  seen  to  stop  under  the 
opposite  bank,  listening  to  the  Lurlei-like 
strains.  (N.B. — I  hope  we  did  not  cause 
their  deaths  from  rheumatic  fever.) 

But  the  worst  times  come  to  an  end,  if  you 
can  only  wait  long  enough.  B>y  seven  p.  jm. 
we  looked  out  on  a  cloudless  sky  and  a  shin- 
ing river.  Ere  we  started  for  another  sunset 
row,  Adam  said,  briefly,  "There^'s  fish  for 
supper,  ma'am."  He  too  had  utilized  the 
wet  day,  and  behold  !  a  dozen  small  dace. 


46  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

caught  by  some  fishing-tackle  he  had  bor- 
rowed, were  swiinraing  in  a  bucket,  alike  in- 
different to  the  hook  they  had  swallowed 
and  the  prospect  of  being  speedily  fried. 

Adam's  pride  in  his  piscatory  exploit  was 
a  little  lessened  an  hour  after,  when  we  found 
him,  with  mingled  laughter  and  anxiety,  gaz- 
ing after  a  majestic  swan,  which  had  swal- 
lowed the  baited  hook,  and  then  swam  away, 
carrying  rod  and  line  away  also.  It  took  a 
long  chase  to  recover  both,  but  they  ^vere 
recovered;  and  so,  we  concluded,  was  tlie 
swan,  for  he  reappeared  shortly  after  as  live- 
ly as  ever,  and  ate  the  food  we  threw  out  to 
him  with  his  usual  dignity  and  grace. 

These  swans  are  the  pride  and  ornament 
of  the  Thames.  They  belong  to  the  Thames 
Conservancy  Corporation,  and  no  one  is  al- 
lowed to  molest  or  destroy  them.  They  sail 
about  like  kings  and  queens,  followed  by 
their  families,  and  are  petted  and  fed  and 
admired  till  they  become  quite  tame.  It  was 
our  great  amusement  to  collect  them  round 


IN  A  HOUSEBOAT.  47 

the  boat,  and  get  them  to  eat  out  of  our 
hands,  and  their  graceful  motions  were  a  de- 
light to  behold. 

The  last  of  our  six  happy  days  had  now 
come,  at  least  our  last  whole  day — Friday. 
We  resolved  to  make  the  most  of  it,  by  gO: 
ing  up  the  river  in  the  forenoon  and  down 
in  the  afternoon,  taking  with  us  a  frugal  meal 
of  bread  and  butter,  milk  and  cherries,  also 
the  towing  rope,  in  case  rowing  up  stream 
should  be  too  difficult  and  too  long  a  busi- 
ness. There  is  a  towing-path  all  the  way 
along  the  Thames,  at  one  side  or  other,  and 
we  used  often  to  see  a  young  man,  or  even  a 
gir],  or  sometimes  both,  amicably  harnessed 
together,  pulling  along  a  whole  boatful  of 
people  with  the  greatest  ease.  We  thought 
the  towing,  if  necessary,  would  be  great  fun 
for  the  after-dinner  row. 

Our  morning  row  was  a  failure,  being 
much  too  "genteel."  The  river  flowed  be- 
tween civilized  shores,  dotted  with  splendid 
villas.     Its  banks  were  elegantly  boarded  in 


48  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

for  jiromenades,  its  very  boat-houses  weve 
palatial  residences.  No  osiers,  rushes,  and 
lovely  water-plants;  the  very  water-lilies 
looked  cultivated.  We  ac^reed  that  our  own 
bit  of  river  was  much  the  best,  and  that  not 
a  single  house-boat — we  passed  half  a  dozen 
at  least — was  half  so  pretty  or  so  commodi- 
ous as  our  Pinafore.  Content  and  hungry, 
we  came  back  to  it,  determined  to  eat  our 
dinner  in  ten  minutes,  and  be  off  again ;  but 
fate  intervened. 

"  Listen  !  that's  surely  thunder !  And  how 
black  the  river  looks !  It  is  bubbling,  too, 
all  over!     Hark!" 

Crash,  crash,  and  down  came  the  rain,  reg- 
ular thunder  rain,  continuing  without  a  mo- 
ment's pause  for  three  hours.  Drenched 
boat-loads  of  unlucky  pleasure-seekers  kept 
passing  our  windows,  struggling  for  the  hos- 
pitable inn  opposite. 

"  Still,  yesterday  evening  was  lovely ;  this 
evening  may  be  the  same,"  said  the  girls, 
determined  to  keep  up  their  spirits.     And 


IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT.  49 

when  at  last  the  rain  did  actually  cease,  and 
a  bit  of  blue  sky  appeared — "  enough  to 
make  a  sailor's  jacket " — they  set  to  work  bal- 
ing out  and  drying  the  boat,  protesting  the 
while  that  the  occupation  was  "  delightful." 
Fortune  favors  the  brave.  The  little  Bib 
had  been  so  thoroughly  soaked  that,  work 
as  we  might,  it  was  seven  o'clock  before  we 
were  able  to  start;  but  that  last  row  was 
the  loveliest  we  had.  Such  a  sunset!  such 
views!  of  osier  beds,  and  islands  of  tall 
rushes,  and  masses  of  woodland,  and  smooth, 
green  parks  with  huge  century-old  trees,  and 
noisy  weirs,  and  dark,  silent  locks  !  We  had 
now  grown  fearless,  or  desperate,  and  deter- 
mined to  go  through  two  locks,  which  was 
accomplished  without  any  accident.  On — on 
we  rowed.  Some  of  us  would  have  liked  to 
row  oil  forever,  drifting  contentedly  down 
the  rapid  stream.  But  motherly  wisdom, 
seeing  the  sun  fast  sinking  and  the  twilight 
darkening,  insisted  on  turning  homewards, 
and  was  obeyed. 


50  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

Only  once,  when  the  crimson  sunset,  re- 
fleeted  in  the  river  from  behind  a  frino;e  of 
low  trees,  made  a  picture  too  lovely  to  resist, 
our  artist  implored  to  be  "  dropped,"  as  was 
her  habit  when  she  saw  anything  desirable 
to  sketch ;  which  being  impossible  at  that 
hour,  we  compromised  by  "lying  to,"  for 
half  an  hour,  while  she  painted,  or  tried  to 
paint,  in  the  dim  light.  She  worked,  and 
we  sang;  a  quantity  of  old  songs,  duets,  and 
glees.  In  the  pauses  the  corncrake  put  in 
his  note  from  the  shore,  and  one  or  two  other 
birds  wakened  up  with  a  sleepy  chirp;  then 
all  sank  into  silence,  and  there  were  only 
the  quiet  river  and  the  quiet  sky,  up  which 
the  crescent  moon  was  sailing,  brighter  and 
brighter.  I  think,  however  long  my  girls 
may  live,  and  whatever  vicissitudes  they 
may  go  through,  they  will  never  forget  that 
nicrht. 

For  it  was  not  evening,  but  actual  night, 
when  we  reached  our  "  'appy  'ome."  Adam 
was  anxiously  watching — since  besides  his 


IN  A  HOUSEBOAT.  5I 

mistress  and  her  girls,  his  own  young  daugh- 
ter was  on  board  with  us. 

"Did  you  think  anything  had  happened 
— that  we  were  all  drowned  ?" 

"  Yes,  ma'am,  I  did,"  said  he,  briefl}'. 

Poor  Adam,  shut  up  in  his  floating  pris- 
on, had  evidently  not  spent  the  happiest  of 
evenings.  But  we  had ;  and — it  was  our 
last. 

About  eleven  or  so,  when  the  magpie's  nest 
had  all  sunk  into  silence,  I  saw  the  loveliest 
moon-set.  The  large,  bright  crescent  close 
upon  the  horizon  shone  in  a  cloudless  west- 
ern sky,  and  was  reflected  in  the  river,  with 
a  gulf  of  darkness  between.  After  watching 
it  for  several  minutes,  determined  not  to  go 
to  bed  till  I  had  seen  the  last  of  it,  I  went 
back  into  my  cabin,  and  took  up  a  book — 
"Essays,"  by  Miss  Thackeray.  One,  "On 
Friendship,"  interested  and  touched  me  so 
much  that  I  read  on  to  the  end — tlien  started 
up  and  rushed  to  the  window.  It  was  too 
late.     My  moon  had  set !     Only  a  faint  cir- 


52  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

cle  of  light  in  the  sky,  and  another,  fainter 
still  on  the  river,  showed  where  she  had 
been. 

So  I  went  to  bed,  a  little  sad  at  heart  and 
vexed  with  myself  for  having  missed  the 
lovely  sight  by  about  a  minute,  after  having 
sat  up  an  hour  on  purpose  to  watch  it.  Too 
late,  too  late!  Why  cannot  one  always  do, 
not  only  the  right  thing,  but  at  the  right 
time? 

My  girls  had  apparently  discovered  this 
secret.  Long  before  I  was  stirring,  though 
we  old  birds  are  usually  early  birds,  I  heard 
a  great  clatter  and  chatter  in  the  i:)arlor  or 
saloon.  It  was  our  two  "  little  ones,"  broom 
in  hand,  with  their  dresses  tucked  up, 
cleaning  and  sweeping,  throwing  about  tea 
leaves,  taking  up  rugs,  dusting  tables  and 
chairs,  washing  china,  and,  in  short,  fairly 
turning  the  house,  or  house -boat,  out  of 
the  windows.  The  delio-hted  laucjhter  with 
which  they  watched  the  dirt  and  debris 
sail  down   the   river,    a   floating    island    of 


IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT.  53 

rubbish,  was  quite  infectious.  Even  when 
I  summoned  them  to  breakfast,  they  de- 
clined to  come. 

"No,  no,  we  can't  eat  anything  till  we 
have  done  our  w^ork.  AVe  are  determined 
to  leave  the  house-boat  as  clean  and  tidy  as 
Ave  found  it." 

With  which  noble  sentiment  I  entirely 
coincided. 

After  breakfast  there  were  the  cabins  to 
be  put  in  order,  and  all  the  packing  to  be 
done.  It  was  eleven  before  we  felt  free  to 
enjoy  ourselves,  and  then  the  sky  looked  so 
threatening  that  I  protested  against  the  long 
expedition  which  had  been  planned.  Sup- 
pose it  rained— in  fact  it  had  rained  a  little 
— and  w^e  all  got  w^et  through,  and  had  to 
start  for  our  long  railway  journey  in  damp 
clothes,  without  any  possibility  of  drying 
ourselves.  So,  in  deference  to  the  prudent 
mother,  wdio  never  denied  them  anything 
she  could  help,  the  good  girls  cheerfully 
gave  up  their  expedition,  and  we  spent  a 


54  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS 

cleliglitful  hour  or  two  in  paddling  abont 
close  at  home  and  gathering  water-lilies. 

This  last  proceeding  was  not  so  easy  as  it 
looked.  Water-lilies  have  such  thick,  strong 
stalks,  and  grow  in  such  deep  water,  that  in 
plucking  them  one  is  a23t  to  overbalance  the 
boat,  especially  if  fully  laden.  We  had  to 
land  half  of  our  crew  on  an  osier  island, 
•while  the  others  floated  about,  cjuidins:  them- 
selves  with  the  boat-hook,  and  cautiously 
grasping  at  the  dazzling  white  blossoms  and 
platelike  leaves  which  covered  the  surface 
of  the  water  for  many  yards.  A  risky  pro- 
ceeding it  always  is — gathering  water-lil- 
ies; but,  when  gathered,  what  a  handful, 
nay,  armful — of  beauty  and  perfume  they 
are ! 

We  got  back  not  a  minute  too  soon ;  and 
liad  scarcely  sat  down  to  dinner,  our  last 
dinner — at  which  w^e  laughed  much,  perhaps 
to  keep  up  our  spirits — when  flash  !  crack ! 
the  storm  was  upon  us — and  a  more  fearful 
thunderstorm  I  never  saw.     The  river  was 


IN  A  HOUSE-BOAT.  55 

one  boiling  sheet  of  splashing  rain ;  the 
clouds  were  black  as  night;  between  them 
and  the  water  the  forked  lightning  danced  ; 
and  once,  when,  after  a  loud  clap  of  thunder, 
a  column  of  white  smoke  burst  out  from  the 
wood  opposite,  we  felt  sure  the  bolt  had 
Mien. 

For  two  whole  hours  the  storm  raided ; 
and  then,  just  as  we  Avere  wondering  if 
the  wagonet  Avould  venture  to  come  for  us, 
and  how  we  should  accomplish  our  seven 
miles'  drive  without  beinsj  drenched  to  the 
skin,  the  rain  ceased,  the  blue  sky  appeared, 
and  the  world  looked  and  felt — as  the  world 
feels  after  the  thunderstorm  in  Beethoven's 
Pastoral  Symphony. 

And  so,  with  contented,  thankful  hearts, 
although  a  little  melancholy,  and  with  the 
very  tune  of  the  reapers'  Thanksgiving  song 
out  of  the  said  symphony  ringing  in  our 
ears,  we  left  our  sweet  little  house-boat  and 
our  beautiful  Thames — and  went  our  several 
ways  homeward. 


56  SIX  HAPPY  DAYS. 

"  We  may  never  in  all  our  lives  liave  six 
such  happy  days,"  said  one  of  the  girls, 
mournfully. 

Which  is  very  possible ;  but  ought  we  not. 
to  be  glad  that  we  ever  had  them  at  all? 


LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

A  LAY  SERMON. 

Lately,  'wandering  alone  on  a  wild  sea- 
shore, I  was  overtaken  by  a  benevolent-look- 
ing elderly  gentleman,  who  addressed  me 
with  great  politeness^  "Maara,  I  have  been 
watching  you  some  time;  you  walk  very 
feebly."  (I  owned  placidly  the  sad  but 
long-expected  fact.)  "Will  you  take  this? 
A  free  gift— like  salvation." 

It  was  a  tract,  of  which  the  title,  "  Home, 
Sweet  Home,"  touched  me  in  a  half  comical, 
half  pathetic  way ;  so  I. accepted  it,  and  we 
walked  on  amicably  together,  discussing  the 
scenery,  the  weather,  and  so  on,  exclusively 
mundane  and  commonplace  topics,  for  I  felt 
that  on  other  points  we  should  wholly  dis- 
agree. At  first  I  had  thought  my  friend 
belonged  to  the  Salvation  Army ;  after- 
s' 


53  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

wards  I  concluded  he  was  only  an  oi'dinary 
religious  enthusiast,  and  we  parted  with  mu- 
tual good  wishes.  Some  days  after,  finding 
his  tract  in  my  pocket,  I  read  it. 

It  proved  to  be  a  highly  imaginative  and 
sentimental  description  of  that  Home  divine 
of  which,  as  it  truly  observed,  "were  we  in- 
dulged with  a  sensible  display,  all  the  duties 
of  life  would  come  to  an  end."  Whence  it 
argued,  with  a  somewhat  hazy  non  seqidtm% 
"  though  it  is  too  plain  that  earth  acts  too 
powerfully  on  our  souls,"  we  ought  to  do  our 
best  to  ignore  the  said  "vain  world," and  as- 
pire to  tlie  "  world  of  light  and  love."  But 
I  need  not  quote  further  from  a  style  of 
]ihraseology  which  is  well  known  to  every 
one,  and,  being  dear  to  some,  should  be  treated 
Avith  respect  by  all. 

The  point  therein  which  chiefly  struck  me 
was  its  contrast — or,  rather,  its  similarity  in 
dilTerence — to  ceviam  pronunciamenti  of  the 
1  ationalistic  and  materialistic  scliools,  whicli 
make  heterodoxy  as  illiberal  and  dogmatic  as 


A  LAY  SERMON.  59 

orthodoxy,  and  cause  the  pessimism  of  "  Eat 
and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  die,"  to  arrive  at 
much  the  same  result  as  that  ascetic  or  mys- 
tic optimism  which,  ignoring  entirely  "  this 
poor,  dying  world,"  looks  solely  to  the  next 
world  for  its  satisfaction  and  reward.  Thus 
the  un-Christlike  Christian  and  the  resigned 
or  indifferent  sceptic  meet  on  much  the  same 
plane,  so  far  as  this  present  existence  is  con- 
cerned, and  ask  each  other,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  the  same  question  —  "Is  life 
worth  livinoj?" 

One  answer  comes  from  a  set  of "  unbe- 
lievers," as  orthodox  church-goers  would  call 
them,  but  whose  unfaith  is  of  the  most  pathetic 
kind.  It  is  not  that  they  will  not,  they  can- 
not believe.  The  spiritual  sense  has  not  been 
developed  in  them.  They  can  no  more  take 
in  the  doctrines  of  revelation,  or  the  possi- 
bility of  any  revelation  at  all,  than  a  short- 
sighted man  could  see  the  Alps  at  a  hundred 
miles  off.  Yet  they  are  people  of  pure  lives 
and  high  aspirations — Christians  in  spite  of 


QQ  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH. 

themselves ;  and  it  is  with  a  sad  regret  rather 
tlian  an  angry  contempt  that  they  set  aside 
the  Christian  dogmas  as  untenable.  Life  to 
them  is  an  unsolvable  mystery.  They  cannot 
explain  what  it  is,  whence  it  comes  and 
whither  it  goes ;  but  they  think  it  should  be 
accepted  and  made  the  best  of;  used  nobly, 
and  laid  down  calmly,  each  individual  being 
merely  one  of  a  series,  like  the  insects  of  a 
coral  island,  appearing  and  disappearing  for 
the  progressive  development  of  the  species. 

There  is  a  melancholy  heroism  in  this  the- 
ory, and  yet  human  nature  rebels  against 
it.  We  long  to  keep  our  identity,  and  not 
become  mere  atoms  in  the  general  mass.  To 
most  of  us  this  present  life  is  worth  little  un- 
less we  can  in  some  way  assert  and  maintain 
our  individuality ;  and  in  speculating  on  the 
life  to  come  I  think  the  secret  cry  of  all  of 
■us  would  be,  "Let  me  remain  myself — able 
to  meet  and  recoo^nize  those  I  love  as  them- 
selves,  else — in  plain  truth— I  would  not  care 
for  any  after-life  at  all." 


A  LAY  SERMON.  gl 

Therefore,  tliough  life  may  seem  worth 
living,  on  scientific  grounds,  to  those  who  be- 
lieve that  each  generation  drops,  like  leaves 
from  a  tree,  in  its  decay  nourishing  and  ad- 
vantaging the  generation  which  follows  it, 
most  of  us  are  incapable  of  such  philosophic 
self  immolation.  The  old-fashioned  belief  in 
heaven  and  hell  —  reward  and  punishment 
for  each  individual — suits  the  ordinary  mind 
much  better. 

But  do  any  of  these — either  believers  or 
unbelievers — fairly  answer  the  question, "  Is 
life  worth  living?"  A  question  which, 
strange  to  say,  is  as  often  asked  by  those 
who  have  scarcely  begun  to  live,  as  by  those 
who  have  exhausted  life  and  all  its  pleasures, 
to  no  one's  benefit,  not  even  their  own.  Those 
who  have  longest  borne  its  burden,  and 
upon  whom  that  burden  has  lain  heaviest, 
seldom  ask  any  such  question.  They  have 
no  need,  for  in  tacitly  accepting  life,  such  as 
it  is,  and  trying  to  make  the  best  of  it,  they 
have  found  out  its  true  worth.    To  them  has 


52  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

been  revealed  the  great  secret,  tauglit  by  the 
Divine  Master  himself:  "The  kingdom  of 
heaven  is  witliin  youP 

It  is  this  "  kingdom  of  heaven,"  the  spirit- 
ual land  of  perpetual  calm,  with  its  atmos- 
phere of  love,  peace,  and  purity  lying  far  be- 
low or  above  all  the  tempestuous  currents  of 
this  world,  which,  to  my  thinking,  alone  makes 
life  worth  living.  I  have  seen  it  in  people  of 
all  creeds ;  and,  not  seldom,  in  people  of  no 
creed  at  all ;  dear,  blind  souls,  who  lived  and 
walked  on  earth  in  such  an  unconscious 
Christlike  fashion,  hopeless  of  the  life  im- 
mortal, that  we  could  imagine  how  they  will, 
one  day, 

"  Wake  np  in  glad  surprise, 
And  in  their  Saviour's  image  rise." 

For  he  is  their  Saviour  still,  without  their 
knowing  it. 

I  ought  to  explain  that  by  "  the  kingdom 
of  heaven  "  I  do  not  mean  what  is  ordinarily 
termed  "  salvation,"  or  the  search  after  it. 
*'  Seek  ye  the  kingdom  of  God  and  his  right- 


A  LAY  SERMON.  63 

eousness"  is  tlie  command — and  that  only. 
For  a  man  to  seek  instead  his  own  "  salva- 
tion," as  he  calls  it — to  spend  his  whole  earth- 
ly life  in  trying  for  the  next  life  how  to  keep 
out  of  hell  and  get  into  heaven,  has  always 
seemed  to  me  one  of  the  meanest  creeds  that 
any  mortal  creature  could  hold.  The  '^king- 
dom of  heaven,"  which  w^e  are  to  enter  upon 
in  this  ivorldj  I  take  to  Le  the  seeking,  not 
after  one's  personal  salvation  at  all,  but  after 
God  and  his  will,  as  expressed  in  nature, 
human  nature,  revelation  ;  and  the  accepting 
and  obeying  of  it,  so  as  to  carry  out,  to  the 
utmost  limit  that  our  short  life  allows,  the 
good  of  man  for  the  love  of  God.  This  creed 
alone,  if  clearly  understood  and  devoutly  ac- 
cepted, will  make  life  worth  living,  under 
almost  any  circumstances,  that  the  human 
mind  can  conceive,  except,  perhaps,  a  com- 
plete mental  overthrow. 

And  yet  I  have  heard  some  foolish  young 
people  say, "  they  did  not  wish  to  live  after 
five-and-twenty,"  and  others  still  more  madly 


64  LIFE  AND   ITS  WORTH, 

protest  that  they  would  not  live  to  be  miser- 
able, but,  whenever  fate  denied  them  the  hap- 
piness they  felt  to  be  their  right,  would  them- 
selves take  the  law  into  their  own  hands,  and 
plunge  unbidden  into  the  —  to  them — im- 
penetrable dark.  With  such  as  these  it  is 
impossible  to  argue.  They,  poor  sceptics! 
mistake  the  true  aim  of  existence  as  com- 
pletely as  the  religious  egotist  who  imagines 
that  the  whole  theogony  of  the  universe  is 
set  in  motion  for  the  saving  of  his  own  par- 
ticular soul. 

But  Avhen  one  has  passed  noonday  with 
its  dazzle  and  glare,  and  the  silent  twilight 
shadows  are  gathering  around,  more  and 
more  does  the  conviction  force  itself  upon  us 
that  the  worth  of  life  is — what  we  ourselves 
choose  to  make  it.  Youth  resents,  as  a  kind 
of  wrong,  anything  short  of  perfect  felicity ; 
and  is  forever  attributing  its  ill-luck  to  man- 
kind. Providence,  everything  and  everybody 
but  itself  ,v  Age,  looking  on  life  with  larger 
and  calmer  eyes,  generally  sees  that  in  most 


A  LAY  SERMON.  (55 

cases  where  it  is  said  to  be  "  not  worth  hav- 
ing," it  is  because  the  recipient  has  not  de- 
served to  possess  it. 

"Is  life  worth  living?"  "That  depends 
upon  the  liver^^  answers  the  punster — which 
is  only  too  true.  How  many  a  miserable 
sceptic,  a  ruined  genius,  a  social  nuisance,  or 
a  domestic  brute,  has  been  made  out  of  a 
man  who,  by  neglecting  the"  laws  of  health, 
literally  destroyed  himself  and  all  belonging 
to  him. 

The  origin  of  evil — let  divines  say  what 
they  will — is  absolutely  hidden  from  the 
sight  of  mortal  eyes.  This,  however,  we  can 
see  plain  enough,  if  only  we  choose  to  see, 
that  most  evils  (not  all,  but  most),  which  at 
first  appear  the  result  of  blind  chance  (I  can- 
not believe  in  "chastisements"  specially  in- 
flicted upon  the  finite  by  the  Infinite),  may, 
soon  or  late,  be  traced  to  our  infractions  of 
those  divine  laws  of  morality,  health,  com- 
mon-sense, and  justice  which  have  been  laid 
down  for  our  preservation,  bodily  and  spirit- 


(56  LIFE  AND   ITS  WORTH, 

iial,  during  our  sojourn  in  tliis  world.  He 
who  breaks  these  laws  goes  against  the  will 
of  God,  and  God  can  no  more  shield  him,  or, 
alas  !  his — for  no  one  suffers  alone — from  the 
consequence  of  this  sin,  than  you,  if  you  have 
told  your  child  not  to  put  his  hand  into  the 
fire,  can  prevent  its  being  burned.  And  he 
who  best  fulfils  them  is  most  likely  to  under- 
stand the  worth  of  life,  inasmuch  as  the  one 
aim  of  his  existence  is — without  irreverence 
be  it  spoken — the  humble  cry — "  Lo,  I  come 
to  do  thy  will,  O  God." 

Yes.  To  do  God's  will,  so  far  as  we  are 
able  to  discern  it,  seems,  to  all  truly  Chris- 
tian souls — and  I  number  among  these  many 
who  are  unconscious  Christians — sufficient 
reason  for  our  being  put  into  life  at  all,  and 
the  doino*  of  it  alone  makes  life  worth  livinc^. 
I  can  imagine  a  human  being,  who  had  lost 
all  personal  joys,  to  whom  existence  might 
yet  be  dear,  and  even  pleasurable,  simply 
from  the  sense  of  beino^  still  the  servant  of 
God — of  obeying   and    liaving   obeyed    his 


A  LAY  SERMON.  67 

commands — being  content  to  live  as  long  as 
he  ordains  life,  or  to  die,  which  may  be  "ftir 
better;"  but  in  noways  either  ignoring  or 
despising  life,  and  determined  not  only  to 
endure  but  to  enjoy  it,  to  the  last  limit  of 
mortal  breath. 

It  is  for  this  reason,  perhaps — tlie  reason 
somewhat  hazily  put  forward  by  the  author 
of  the  tract  ^^ Home, Sweet  Home" — that  the 
Father  of  us  all  has  so  closely  shut  the  gates 
between  this  world  and  the  next.  Much  as 
we  may  crave  for  it,  we  are  not  meant  to 
look  beyond  the  grave.  Haply,  the  vision 
would  blind  us  to  all  the  interests  and  duties 
of  this  life,  which  might  thus  appear  to  so 
many  of  us — especially  those  to  whom  it  has 
been  a  long  walking  in  darkness,  weariness, 
and  pain — as  truly  not  worth  living.  But  it 
is  worth  living,  and  we  are  meant  to  live  it. 
Why  or  wherefore,  is  altogether  beside  the 
(question. 

I  once  heard  a  good  and  wise  man,  a  cler- 
gyman, too,  reprove  a  little  girl   who  was 


(38  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

craving  after  something  in  the  future,  some- 
thing different  from  what  she  had.  "My 
child,"  he  said,  "  you  are  like  many  people  I 
know ;  you  are  always  wanting  to  live  next 
door." 

We  elder  folk,  who  have  learned  what  a 
mere  shadow  life  is — "so  soon  passeth  it 
away  audit  is  gone"— often  look  with  deep 
sadness  at  the  young  who  are  perpetually 
throwing  away  its  blessings,  wasting  time, 
health,  love,  happiness,  by  always  fancying 
that  to-morrow  will  be  better  than  to-day. 
Equally  sad,  I  hold,  is  it  to  observe  certain 
sects  of  stern  and  yet  fearful  Christians,  who 
think  that  Christianity  consists  in  abolishing 
every  pleasure  of  this  life  for  the  sake  of  the 
life  to  come ;  making  of  the  Infinite  Love  a 
cruel  taskmaster  who  insists  upon  our  loving 
and  serving  himself  alone,  and  regarding  our 
present  existence  as  altogether  miserable, 
evil,  and  wretched,  a  mere  stepping-stone  to 
the  "joys  of  heaven,"  whatever  or  wherever 
that  may  be.     Such  people  generally  look 


A  LAY  SERMON.  69 

forward  to  a  heaven  of  their  own  inventing, 
which  others  would  not  wish  to  inhabit  on 
any  pretext  whatever. 

I  would  that  clergymen,  like  the  good 
man  I  have  referred  to,  would  cease  a  little 
to  preach  about  *'  next  door  " — which  is  as 
much  shut  to  them  as  it  is  to  us,  except  in 
their  own  imagination — and  tell  us  more 
about  this  present  existence :  its  value,  its 
blessedness,  its  duties,  to  ourselves  and  to 
our  neiglibors.  They  should  try  to  teach  us, 
not  how  to  die,  but  how  to  live;  "  with  God 
in  the  world"  (not  without  him),  but  in  the 
world  still.  Not  dwelling  too  much  upon 
"  another  and  a  better  world  " — which,  for  all 
we  know,  may  not  be  a  better  to  many. 

And  how  good  this  world  is,  if  we  have 
only  eyes  to  see  it  as  such,  and  hearts  that 
help  to  make  it  so !  If  we  could  eliminate 
from  it  one  thing,  sin,  our  own  and  others', 
how  well  we  could  bear  all  else — sorrow, 
sickness,  even  death  !  Except  death,  almost 
everything  evil  in  our  lives  can  be  traced  to 


70  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

sill — sins  of  omission  or  of  commission  ;  and 
liaving  discovered  this,  there  we  are  obliged 
to  leave  it — the  long  chain  of  sequences  into 
whose  mysteiy  we  can  never  pierce.  Only 
as  far  as  our  own  life  goes  can  we  learn  tlie 
inevitable  truth  that  "as  a  man  soweth  so 
shall  he  reap." 

Is  life  worth  living?  Surely  it  is,  if  only 
for  the  beauty  of  the  external  world,  that 
visible  perfection  of  Nature  which  we  oft^n 
cling  to  as  a  token  of  the  perfection,  invisible 
and  divine,  to  which  we  all  aspire.  More 
and  more  so,  I  think,  as  the  years  narrow  in 
which  we  shall  rejoice  in  the  one,  and  bring 
us  nearer  to  that  mysterious  day  when  we 
shall  find  out  the  secret  of  the  other.  There 
is  something  pathetic  and  yet  hopeful  in  the 
sight  of  an  old  lady  tottering  round  her  gar- 
den, delighting  in  her  flowers  as  if  she  had 
fifty  summers  to  enjoy  them  in,  and  yet  she 
may  not  have  another  week ;  or  an  old  man, 
looking  with  dim  but  contented  eyes  on  the 
lovely  landscape  which  he  will  never  walk  in 


A  LAY  SERMON.  71 

more.  We  are  passing  away,  and  we  know 
it;  but  the  beauty  we  adore  as  our  nearest 
and  most  tano^ible  evidence  of  the  divine 
perfection  behind  it  must,  in  some  shape  or 
other,  be  as  eternal  as  divinity  itself. 

Happy  they  who  can  see  it  thus !  it  will 
help  them  to  find  life  worth  living  to  the 
very  last.  I  remember,  during  another  soli- 
tary wander  in  that  lovely  island  to  which  I 
have  referred,  toiling  up  a  steep  brae;  when 
there  came  up  after  me  a  lady,  unknown  to 
me  as  I  to  her,  but  we  both  turned  I'ound 
and  smiled. 

"It  is  very  steep,"  she  said.  From  her 
face  I  should  have  supposed  her  to  be  some 
years  nearer  even  than  I  was  to  that  "Home, 
Sweet  Home,"  of  which  my  other  elderly 
friend  had  reminded  me ;  and  it  was  a  face 
that  had  surely  known  trouble,  yet  had  a 
peaceful  and  sunshiny  look  that  somehow 
warmed  one's  heart. 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "these  hills  are  steep — I 
find  them  so — but  how  beautiful  they  are!" 


72  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

"  It  is  the  clear  shining  after  j'ain.  Did 
you  notice  the  rainbows?  I  think  I  never 
saw  so  many  rainbows  as  I  did  this  morning. 
And  the  mountains,  just  look  at  them!  I 
like  to  watch  them.  They  remind  me  oi His 
lover 

It  was  said  with  the  utmost  simplicity — 
a  mere  chance  word,  yet  I  never  forgot  it. 
All  through  that  peaceful  time,  on  golden 
mornings,  when  the  little  island  lay  like  a 
jewel  set  in  an  azure  sea;  of  stormy  after- 
noons, when  the  hilltops  grew  dark  purple 
against  the  cloudy  sky ;  and  more  than  once, 
in  a  gorgeous  midnight,  when  every  living 
creature  was  asleep,  and  I  and  the  harvest 
moon  had  the  world  all  to  ourselves,  in  a 
warmth  like  June  and  a  stillness  so  deep  that 
the  murmur  of  the  burn,  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
off,  was  distinctly  heard — there  used  to  come 
back  upon  my  mind  the  saying  of  that  simple 
woman,  and  I  felt  "  Ilis  love." 

Nothino;  can  come  out  of  nothin^f.  Whether 
one  always  sees  it  or  not,  and  sometimes  life 


A  LAY  SERMON.  73 

is  SO  dark  that  one  cannot  see  it,  His  love 
must — so  long  as  there  is  any  sweetness,  any 
loveliness,  any  joy  in  the  world — be  there. 

No  one,  at  least  no  one  who  has  lived  as 
long  as  I  have,  -would  attempt  to  ignore  the 
agonies  of  life:  its  bitter  disappointments, 
its  cruel  losses,  its  sufferings  of  mind  and 
body;  griefs  that  come  direct  from  God; 
and  others,  harder  to  bear,  that  seem  to 
come  throu2[h  man — ancjuishes  needless  and 
avoidable.  We  all  know  them.  Each  one 
has  his  own  burden  to  carry;  the  only  dif- 
ference is  liow  he  carries  it;  "whether  it 
crushes  him,  that  is,  whether  he  allows  it 
to  crush  him,  or  not.  Therefore  I  hold,  and 
I  repeat  it  once  more,  that  the  worth  of  life 
lies  in  a  man's  own  hands;  and,  knowing 
this,  it  is  piteous  to  see  the  young  throwing 
life  away,  w^asting  time,  health,  love,  happi- 
ness ;  squandering  madly  all  these  blessings 
which  will  never  return,  and  then  accusing 
Providence  of  making  life  not  worth  living. 

Not  long  since  I  sat  by  the  bedside  of  one 
4 


74  LIFE  AND  ITS  WORTH, 

who  had  long  passed  the  threescore  years  and 
ten  of  the  Psalmist,  and  was  waiting  in  much 
weariness  and  pain,  but  calmly  and  content- 
edly, for  that  passing  "  out  of  one  room  into 
the  next "  which  our  great  preacher  as  well 
as  poet,  Alfred  Tennyson,  speaks  of  She 
and  I  were  discussing  this  sad  question  of 
the  present  day,  "  Is  life  worth  living  V  and  I 
told  her  how  I  meant  to  try  and  write  some 
answer  to  it;  in  fact  I  gave  her  a  brief  out- 
line of  this,  ray  lay  sermon. 

She  listened  with  deep  interest  to  all  I 
said,  and  was  tenderly  eager  that  I  should 
write  this  paper,  which  we  both  knew  she 
raic^ht  never  live  to  read. 

"You  and  I,"  I  said,  "  have  felt  more  than 
raost  how  hard  life  is;  but  we  also  feel  that 
it  is  worth  living." 

"  Yes,"  she  answered,  lifting  herself  up  in 
bed  and  speaking  with  her  own  firm,  clear 
voice,  while  her  faded  eyes  shone  as  with 
the  Yv^ht  of  the  unseen  world,  to  which  she 
was  fast  hastening — "  yes,  quite." 


A  LAY  SERMON.  75 

And  ill  these  feeble  words  of  mine  — 
which  she  never  did  read — I  put  forward 
my  solemn  affirmation  that  her  faith  was 
true. 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG. 

He  was  the  sweetest  lamb — no,  pig — that 
ever  perished  in  infant  bloom.  As  he  lay 
on  my  kitchen  table,  white  as  milk  from 
head  to  tail,  his  poor  little  pink  eyes  half- 
open,  and  his  tiny  feet — let  us  say  at  once 
his  pettitoes — stretched  out  as  if  in  helpless 
submission  to  destiny,  my  heart  melted.  So 
did  the  hearts  of  all  my  women  servants, 
who  gathered  round  him,  contemplating  him 
with  an  air  of  mild  melancholy. 

"  He  does  look  so  like  a  baby  !"  said  one. 
(So  he  did — the  Duchess's  baby  in  "  Alice's 
Adventures,"  which  is  by  turns  an  infant 
and  a  little  pig.) 

"  I  don't  think  I  could  cook  him,"  remarked 
the  cook,  a  matronly  and  tender-hearted  per- 
son, who  had  had  a  good  deal  to  do  with 
babies. 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG.  77 

"And  I'm  sure  I  wouldn't  eat  him,"  add- 
ed, with  dignity,  the  parlor-maid. 

"  We  none  of  us  could  eat  Lim,"  was  the 
general  cliorus.  And  they  all  looked  at  me 
as  if  I  were  a  sort  of  female  Herod.  Evi- 
dently tliey  had  never  read  Charles  Lamb, 
and  were  unappreciative  of  their  gustatory 
blessings. 

As  for  me,  I  slowly  took  in  the  diflSculties 
of  the  position,  and  as  I  gazed  down  on  the 
martyred  innocent  lying  on  the  table — to 
quote  a  line  from  an  old  drama — I  "knew 
how  murderers  feel." 

Yet  I  was  only  an  accessory  after  the  fact. 
I  did  not  kill  the  helpless  innocent;  his 
death  happened  thus :  A  much-valued  friend, 
who  is  always  ready  to  do  a  kindness  to 
anybody,  one  day  offered  my  husband  a 
sucking-pig,  which  he  refused,  and  the  dainty 
was  given  to  somebody  else.  Immediately 
afterwards  I  happened  to  say  I  was  sorry 
for  this,  as  I  liked  pig. 

"Then,"  answered  the  friend,  "you  shall 


78  THE   STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG. 

have  one — out  of  the  very  next  litter.  I  shall 
not  forget.  It  is  a  promise."  Which,  after 
an  interv^al  of  several  months,  during  which 
I  myself  had  entirely  forgotten  it,  he  thus 
faithfully  kept. 

A  special  messenger  brought  the  present 
to  ray  door,  with  the  injunction  that  he  was 
to  be  cooked  that  day  for  dinner  (the  pig, 
not  the  messenger).  And — there  he  lay ! 
with  my  sympathetic  domestic  circle  admir- 
ing- and  lamentinsr  him. 

I  went  and  gathered  the  collective  opinion 
of  the  drawino:-room.  It  was  much  the  same 
as  that  of  the  kitchen.  Several  other  mem- 
bers of  the  family  protested  that  they  "didn't 
care  for  pig,"  and  one  even  w^ent  so  far  as  to 
say  that  if  poor  piggie-wiggie  appeared  on 
our  table,  she  should  be  obliged  to  dine 
out. 

Was  ever  a  mistress  of  a  family  in  such 
a  quandary !  What  was  I  to  do !  Even 
though — (in  common  with  Elia — I  must 
own     to    the    soft    impeachment!)  —  even 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG.  79 

though  I  like  pig — how  could  I  have  one 
cooked  exclusively  for  my  own  eating?  and, 
further,  how  could  I  eat  him  up  myself 
alone?  And  he  required,  like  all  sucking- 
pigs,  to  be  cooked  and  eaten  immediately. 

Between  the  dread  of  annoying  my  whole 
family,  or  the  kindly  friend  who  had  wished 
to  give  me  pleasure,  I  was  in  despair,  till  a 
brisjht  idea  struck  me.  Near  at  hand  was  a 
household  of  mutual  acquaintances — a  large 
liousehold,  who  could  easily  consume  even 
two  pigs,  and  to  whom  my  friend  would,  I 
knew,  have  been  as  glad  to  give  pleasure  as 
to  myself. 

. "  Pack  the  pig  up  again  very  carefully," 
said  I,  "and  let  him  be  taken  at  once  to 
Eden  Cottage.  They  are  sure  to  enjoy 
him." 

"  Oh,  yes,  ma'am."  And  a  smile  of  relief 
overspread  the  countenances  of  all  my  do- 
mestics, as  piggie  disappeared  in  great  dig- 
nity, since,  to  save  time,  I  sent  him  away  in 
the  carriage.     So  he  departed,  followed  by 


30  THE  STORY   OF  A  LITTLE  PIG. 

much  admiration  but  i)o  regrets — save,  per- 
haps, mine. 

But  I  had  reckoned  without  my  host. 
Half  an  hour  afterwards  my  parlor-maid 
presented  herself  with  a  long  face. 

"  He  has  come  back,  ma'am." 

"  Who  ?" 

"  The  little  pig.  They  say  they  are  very 
much  obliged,  but  none  of  the  family  like 
pork." 

"He  is  not  pork,"  I  cried,  indignantl}^ 
A  sweet,  tender,  lovely  sucking-pig,  em- 
balmed in  all  classic  memories,  to  call  him 
common  "  pork !"     It  was  profanity. 

Still  something  must  be  done,  for  the  mo- 
ments were  flying.  I  turned  to  a  benevolent 
lady  visitor  and  told  her  my  grief.  She 
laughed,  but  sympathized. 

"  Will  you  take  him  ?"  I  said,  hopefully. 
"Indeed,  he  is  a  great  beauty,  and  I  am  sor- 
vy  to  part  with  him,  but  if  you  would  take 
him—" 

"I  don't  think  my  brother  cares  for  pig; 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG.  gl 

however,  some  of  the  rest  might  like  it,"  an- 
swered the  benign  woman.  "  So,  if  you  are 
quite  sure  you  don't  want  him — " 

*^If  I  wanted  him  ever  so,  I  couldn't  keep 
him.  Do  take  him.  And  I  hope  that  at 
least  your  visitors  will  enjoy  him." 

And  not  until  they  had  departed — ^little 
pig  and  all — did  I  recollect,  and  felt  hot  to 
the  veiy  end  of  my  fingers,  that  to  the  re- 
mote ancestors  of  these,  my  dear  and  excel- 
lent friends,  the  ancestors  of  my  little  pig 
must  have  been  the  most  obnoxious  of  food ! 
But  when  one  has  "put  one's  foot  into  it," 
the  best  thing  is  to  let  it  stop  there,  without 
any  attempt  to  draw  it  out.  So  I  rested  con- 
tent.    My  pig  was  safely  disposed  of. 

At  his  usual  hour  my  husband  entered, 
much  amused. 

"So  you've  got  your  little  pig  at  last. 

M was  so  pleased  about  it,  and  so  kind. 

It  was  kept  on  purpose  for  you.  He  put  it 
in  his  carriasre,  drove  to  town  with  it  him- 
self,  and  sent  it  by  messenger  in  full  time  to 
4* 


g2  THE  STORY  OF   A  LITTLE  PIG. 

be  cooked  for  dinner  to-day.  And  tlie  last 
word  he  said  to  me  was,  *Now  be  sure 
there's  plenty  of  apple-sauce,  and  tell  me  to- 
morrow morning  how  you   all  liked  your 

pig; " 

I  listened  in  blank  dismay.  Then  I  told 
the  whole  storv. 

My  husband's  countenance  was  a  sight  to 
behold.  ^' Given  him  away!  Given  away 
your  little  pig !  What  will  M say,  af- 
ter all  his  kindness  and  the  trouble  he  took ! 
How  shall  I  ever  face  him  to-morrow  morn- 


ing?" 


In  truth  it  was  a  most  perplexing  position. 

"There  is  only  one  thing  to  be  done,"  said 
my  husband,  decisively.  "  You  must  send 
and  fetch  the  pig  back  immediately." 

I  explained  with  great  contrition  that  this 
was  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  as  he  was 
probably  just  then  in  the  very  act  of  being 
roasted  six  miles  off. 

"But  can  we  not  get  him  somehow  or 
other?     We  7niist  eat  him,  or  at  least  be 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG.  §3 

able  to  say  we  have  eaten  liirn.     M will 

l)e  so  disappointed,  quite  hurt  in  -his  feel- 
ings, and  no  wonder.  How  could  you  do 
such  a  thino;?" 

I  felt  very  guilty ;  but  still,  if  I  had  had 
to  do  it  all  over  again,  I  did  not  see  that  I 
could  have  done  differently.  And  the  pig  was 
sure  to  be  eaten  and  enjoyed — by  somebody. 

"  But  not  by  you ;  which  was  what  M 

especially  wished.  Couldn't  you  manage  it 
somehow  ?  Why  not  invite  yourself  to  dine 
with  your  friends — and  the  pig^" 

Alas?  it  was,  as  I  said,  six  miles  off,  and 
there  was  only  half  an  hour  to  spare,  and  we 
had  a  houseful  of  friends  ourselves  that  day. 

"  But  the  day  after  ?  Couldn't  we  drive 
over,  fetch  him  back — at  least  what  remains 
of  him — and  eat  him  cold  to-morrow  ?" 

This  w\as  too  bright  an  idea  to  lose.  But 
still  one  diflBculty  remained.  What  was  to 
be  said  to  our  kindly  friend  when  he  asked 
how  we  had  enjoyed  our  pig  next  morning  ? 

"I  declare  I  don't  know  how  to  face  him  " 


84  THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG. 

said  my  husband,  mournfully.  "After  all 
his  kindness,  and  the  trouble  he  took,  and 
the  pleasure  he  had  in  pleasing  you.  The 
first  question  he  is  sure  to  ask  is,  '  How  did 
your  wife  like  her  pig  V  What  in  the  world 
am  I  to  say  to  him  V 

\  Crushed  with  remorse,  I  yet  suggested 
that  "  the  plain  truth,"  as  people  call  it,  is 
usually  found  not  only  the  right  thing,  but 
the  most  convenient.  However,  this  merely 
feminine  wisdom  was  negatived  by  the  high- 
er powers,  and  it  was  agreed  that  our  donor 
should  only  be  told  that  the  pig  was  not  to 
be  eaten  till  to-morrow ;  on  which  to-mor- 
row we  should  drive  over  and  fetch  what 
remained  of  him,  so  as  to  be  able  to  say, 
with  accuracy,  that  we  had  eaten  him,  and 
found  him  uncommonly  good. 

This  was  accordingly  done.  The  fatal 
moment  passed — how,  I  did  not  venture  to 
inquire — my  husband  reappeared  at  home, 
and  we  took  a  pleasant  drive,  and  presented 
ourselves  for  afternoon  tea  at  our  friends' 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG.  85 

house.  They  were  too  hospitable  to  show 
surprise,  or  to  wonder  what  we  had  come  for. 

After  a  few  minutes'  polite  conversation, 
we  looked  at  one  another  to  see  which  of  us 
should  make  the  confession  and  put  the  re- 
quest. 

"The— the  little  pig?"  said  I  at  last,  in 
great  humility. 

"  Oh,  the  little  pig  has  been  cooked  and 
eaten.  He  turned  out  a  great  success.  Some 
of  the  family  enjoyed  him  immensely." 

"Then — is  he  quite  finished?"  I  asked, 
with  meek  despondency. 

"I  will  ring  and  inquire.  No,  I  think 
there  is  a  fragment  left  of  him,  because  my 
brother  thought  you  ought  to  be  asked  to 
dinner  to-day  to  eat  it." 

"  Perhaps  I  might  take  it  home  w^ith  me, 
were  it  only  a  few  mouthful s.  We  have 
a  special  reason.  My  husband  will  ex- 
plain." 

Which  he  did,  pouring  out  the  whole 
story  of  my  sins;  first,  in  being  so  foolish  as 


8(5  THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG. 

to  say  I  liked  a  pig,  then  in  accepting  it, 
and,  lastly,  in  giving  it  away. 

"  And  if  you  had  seen  how  pleased  M 

was,  and  the  trouble  he  took  about  it  all," 
was  always  the  burden  of  the  story,  till  I  felt 
as  if  I  could  never  lift  my  head  again. 

But  my  friends  only  saw  the  comic  phase 
of  the  thing.  They  burst  into  a  chorus  of 
laughter. 

"  It  is  as  good  as  a  play.  You  ought  to 
write  a  second  ^  Essay  on  Roast  Pig,'  to 
transcend  Elia's.  Comfort  yourself.  You 
shall  still  have  your  pig,  or,  at  least,  what  is 
left  of  him." 

She  rang  the  bell,  and  gave  her  orders  to 
the  politely  astonished  footman,  ^vho,  after  a 
few  minutes,  brought  back  a  most  Medea- 
like messacje. 

"  Please,  ma'am,  cook  says  there's  his  head 
left,  and  one  of  his  legs,  and  a  small  portion 
of  him  still  remains  uncooked,  if  the  lady 
would  like  to  take  that  home — " 

"No,  no,  no,"  said  my  husband,  hastily. 


THE  STORY  OF  A  LITTLE  PIG.  37 

"The  least  little  bit  will  do — a  mere  frag- 
ment, just  to  enable  her  to  say  she  has  eaten 
it.  She  likes  it;  she  was  once  heard  to  say 
that  a  little  pig  tasted  exactly  like  a  baby !" 

Under  the  shout  of  laughter  Avhich  fol- 
lowed this  unlucky  communication,  which 
was,  alas!  quite  true,  I  made  my  retreat. 
But  just  as  I  was  getting  into  the  carriage, 
one  of  the  family  came  running  hastily  out. 

"  Stop  a  minute ;  you  have  forgotten  some- 
thing. You  have  left  behind  you  your  little 
pig." 

What  a  narrow  escape !  Not  until  the 
basket  was  safely  deposited  at  my  feet  did  I 
feel  that  I  had  conquered  fate,  gained  my  end 
and  my  pig ;  and,  what  was  the  most  impor- 
tant element  in  the  matter,  liad  avoided 
wounding  the  feelings  of  my  friend. 

So  we  ate  him — the  pig,  I  mean — at  least 
one  of  his  members.  Very  delicious  he  was, 
fully  justifying  Elia's  commendation  of  him, 
or,  rather,  of  his  race.  He  was  also  fully 
appreciated  by  a  mutual  friend  of  the  donor 


88  THE  STORY   OF  A  LITTLE  PIG. 

and  ourselv^es,  who  happened  to  dine  with 
us  that  da}^,  and  upon  whom  we  impressed 
the  necessity  of  stating  publicly  that  she  had 
eaten  this  identical  pig  in  our  house. 

Peace  to  his  manes !  Let  him  not  perish 
unchronicled,  for  he  was  a  beauty ;  but  let 
his  history  be  recorded  here — a  story  with- 
out a  plot,  or  a  purpose,  or  a  moral.  Except, 
perhaps,  the  trite  one,  that  truth  is  best. 
How  much  or  how  little  of  it  has  reached  my 
friend  I  know  not,  but  when  he  reads  this 
in  print  perhaps  he  will  feel  that  his  kindly 
gift  was  not  altogether  thrown  away. 


GENIUS, 

ITS  ABERRATIONS  AND  ITS  RESPONSIBILITIES. 

There  Las  been  of  late,  thanks  to  the  want 
of  reticence  of  some  people,  and  the  omnivo- 
rous curiosity  of  others,  a  perfect  avalanche 
of  talk,  earnest  argument  and  frivolous  gos- 
sip, newspaper  articles  and  dinner  -  table 
fights,  on  the  subject  of  genius — its  rights 
and  its  immunities,  its  errors  and  their  ex- 
cuses, its  aberrations  and  their  results.  Of 
course,  every  person  has  a  different  opinion ; 
therefore  it  can  do  no  harm  to  advance  one 
more,  rather  contrary  to  the  opinions  gener- 
ally promulgated. 

We  may  premise,  and,  I  suppose,  take  for 
granted,  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  genius ; 
that  inherent  and  inexplicable  quality  which 
here  and  there  distinguishes  one  human  be- 
ins:  from  the  common  herd.     Talent  is  the 


90  GENIUS. 

successful  use  of  certain  capacities,  possessed 
iu  more  or  less  degree  by  us  all;  but  genius 
is  original,  unique;  and  in  whatever  form  it 
may  develop  itself  is  the  greatest  gift  that 
can  be  given  to  man,  the  strongest  known 
link  between  the  material  life  we  have  and 
the  spiritual  life  that  we  can  only  guess  at. 
Every  great  poet,  painter,  or  musician — every 
inventor  or  man  of  science,  every  fine  actor 
or  orator,  comes  to  us  as  the  exponent  of 
something:  diviner  than  we  know.  We  can- 
not  understand  it,  but  we  feel  it,  and  ac- 
knowledoje  it. 

And,  in  our  ignorance,  we  are  prone  to 
consider  it  as  a  thing  apart ;  and  its  posses- 
sor as  a  creature  apart,  not  to  be  judged  by 
the  same  laws,  or  treated  in  the  same  man- 
ner, as  other  human  beings.  A  city  set  on  a^ 
hill  cannot  be  hid.  Once  let  a  man  be  rec- 
ognized as  a  man  of  genius,  and  the  world 
is  apt  to  regard  him  as  something  exceptional 
— either  a  divinity  or  a  fool.  His  virtues, 
his  vices,  are  attributed,  not  to  the  human 


GENIUS.  91 

nature  which  he  shares  in  common  with  us 
all,  but  to  that  something  which  he  possesses 
beyond  us  all — his  genius. 

Let  us  instance  a  late  lamentable  case, 
over  which  society  has  fought  and  howled, 
like  dogs  over  garbage.  Two  people,  man 
and  wife,  of  whom  one  was  supposed  to  be, 
and  both  really  were,  wonderfully  gifted, 
succeed  in  making  one  another  thoroughly 
miserable.  Why  ?  Because  the  woman  mar- 
ried, out  of  wounded  feminine  pride  or  (she 
owned)  for  "  ambition,"  a  self  absorbed,  ego- 
tistical, ill-tempered  man,  who  had  ruined 
his  constitution  by  his  persistent  breaking 
of  every  law  of  health.  Disappointed,  neg- 
lected, she  does  her  wifely  duty  in  a  literal 
sense,  but  she  seasons  it  with  incessant  com- 
plaints and  the  cruel  use  of  that  weapon 
which  is  a  gentlewoman's  instinctive  defence 
against  a  boor — sarcasm.  He  too  lives  a  life 
unimpeachable  externally,  but  within  full  of 
rancor,  malice,  and  a  selfishness  which  ap- 
proaches absolute  cruelty,  his  peasant  nat- 


92  GENIUS. 

lire  perpetually  blinding  him  to  the  suffer- 
ings of  his  wife,  more  gently  born  and  gently 
bred ;  while  her  morbid  sensitiveness  exag- 
gerates trivial  vexations  into  great  misfor- 
tunes, and  mere  follies  into  actual  crimes. 
All  this  wretchedness  sprang,  not  from  the 
man's  genius,  but  from  his  bad  qualities, 
which,  had  he  been  a  brainless  ass,  would 
have  made  his  wife's  life  and  his  own  just  as 
miserable.  Yet  society  moans  out  the  moral, 
"  Never  marry  a  genius  1"  or  the  worse  one, 
"  if  you  do  marry  a  genius  you  must  condone 
all  his  shortcomings,  lay  yourself  down  as  a 
mat  for  him  to  rub  his  shoes  on,  give  him 
everything  and  expect  from  him  nothing,  not 
even  the  commonest  rules  of  domestic  cour- 
tesy and  social  morality." 

Another  example — perhaps  worse,  for  the 
hero  of  it  broke  throu^^h  more  than  the  limits 
of  mere  social  morality.  Take  away  the 
glamour  which  enthusiastic  adorers  have 
thrown  over  the  great  idol  of  Weimar,  and 
what  is  he?     A  modern    imitation  of  the 


GENIUS.  93 

pre-Christian  Greek,  who  knew  no  worship 
but  that  of  beauty,  and  beauty  in  its  lowest 
form,  nnallied  with  good — a  Sybarite,  whose 
god  was  himself,  and  who  did  not  hesitate 
to  sacrifice  to  his  supposed  artistic  culture 
manly  honor  and  womanly  happiness,  for  all 
his  love-affairs  served  him  as  mere  "  experi- 
ences." 

Yet  there  are  those  who  declare  that  this 
breaker  of  women's  hearts,  this  artistic  ex- 
perimentalist, confusing  hopelessly  right  and 
wrong,  was  but  exercising  the  prerogative 
of  all  men  of  genius,  who  "  learn  in  sufi'eriug '' 
— generally  the  suffering  of  others — "what 
they  teach  in  song  "  But  had  he  never  sung 
at  all,  what  a  culpable  life,  execrated  by  all 
good  men  and  poor  women,  ^vould  have  been 
that  of  Wolfgang  von  Goethe ! 

More  instances.  May  not  many  a  young 
Scottish  exciseman,  not  being  also  a  poet, 
have  sunk  lower  and  lower,  through  tempta- 
tions which  he  was  too  weak  to  resist,  to 
find  the   drunkard's   early  and   dishonored 


94  GENIUS. 

grave,  unextenuated  by  all  the  picturesque 
apologies  that  have  been  made  for  Kobert 
Burns?  Was  Richard  Brinsley  Sheridan  the 
only  improvident  Irishman,  charming,  but 
utterly  unreliable,  to  whom  debt  is  a  mere 
joke,  and  a  lie  only  a  poetical  imagination? 
Yet  in  both  cases  the  blame  is  laid,  not  upon 
the  men  themselves  and  their  innate  errors, 
but  upon  the  only  redeeming  quality  they 
possessed — their  genius.  For  which  also,  by 
a  curious  contradiction,  the  world  excuses 
them  everything,  declaring  that — 

"  The  light  which  led  astray 
Was  light  from  heaven ;" 

as  if  any  light  which  led  astray  could  come 
from  heaven  ! 

No!  A  man's  temptations  spring,  not 
from  his  genius — the  divine  thing  in  him — 
but  from  "the  w^orld,  the  flesh,  and  the  devil," 
with  which  he,  and  we  all,  are  forever  bat- 
tling our  whole  lives  long.  If  he  succumbs, 
it  is  himself  he  has  to  blame — his  poor,  miser- 


GENIUS.  95 

able  mortal  nature,  and  not  that  immortal 
part  of  him,  which  came,  he  knows  not  how, 
and  goes,  whither  he  cannot  tell.  In  truth, 
no  one  can  tell  anything  at  all  about  it,  ex- 
cept that  it  is  a  possession  apart,  giving 
keener  sorrows  and  more  ecstatic  joys — mak- 
ing men  of  genius  in  a  sense  more  responsi- 
ble than  other  men,  but  not  exempting  them 
from  the  common  lot  of  humanity. 

It  is  no  excuse  for  the  selfish  lover  and 
faithless  husband  of  "  Bonny  Jean  "  that  he 
wrote  some  of  the  sweetest  love-songs  in  ex- 
istence. It  is  little  glory  to  the  worshipped 
moral  teacher  of  the  last  half-century  that, 
after  bein^:  his  wife's  torment  for  the  most 
of  that  time  (except  for  a  few  beautiful  let- 
ters— it  is  so  easy  to  write  letters !),  he  la- 
mented her  with  a  pathetic  remorse,  the  re- 
ality of  which  no  one  can  doubt,  except  it 
came  too  late  to  convert  words  into  deeds. 

How  sad  a  thins:  it  is  when  a  man  of 
genius  has  to  intrench  himself  behind  his 
works,  as   being   so  much    better  than  his 


95  GEJSIUS. 

personality !  With  a.  woman  of  genius  it  is 
even  worse.  Can  any  writings  of  tLe  two 
greatest  female  novelists  of  the  a^-e — French 
and  English — and  one,  the  Englishwoman, 
full  of  most  noble  qualities — atone  for  the 
lack  in  both  of  that  crown  of  stainless  ma- 
tronhood  which  should  have  adorned  either 
brow,  making  the  life  a  consecration  of  the 
books,  instead  of  the  books  being  a  piteous 
apology  for  the  life  ? 

The  question  stands  thus:  Does  genius 
absolve  either  man  or  woman  from  ordinary 
moral  and  social  laws,  and  every-day  duties? 
Is  it  grand  and  noble,  or  w^eak  and  cow- 
ardly, that  any  one  should  hide  behind  the 
shelter  of  his  brains,  saying,/' This  is  me. 
You  must  not  expect  me  to  be  like  you 
common  mortals,  to  eat,  drink,  and  sleep  as 
you  do,  to  pay  my  debts  and  control  my 
passions,  to  be  a  decent  son,  husband,  father, 
and  citizen.  I  have  only  myself— that  is, 
my  genius — to  think  of.  Everything  must 
be  subservient  to  this.     If  I  break  all  sani- 


GENIUS.  97 

tary  laws,  and  my  health  gives  way,  it  is 
not  I  who  am  accountable,  it  is  my  genius, 
the  sword  wearing  away  the  scabbard.  If 
I  am  irregular,  lazy,  unbusiness  -  like,  and, 
consequently,  always  behindhand  with  the 
world,  it  is  the  world's  neglect,  not  my  own 
improvidence,  which  has  made  me  poor.  If 
I  run  counter  to  all  the  decorums  of  society, 
all  the  doctrines  of  moral  right,  it  is  not  my 
fault;  I  was  not  made  like  other  people, 
and  I  am  not  to  be  judged  by  the  same  laws 
as  they  are." 

This,  put  into  plain  English,  is  the  creed 
of  half  the  world  concerning  genius,  and  of 
genius  concerning  itself.  It  is  time  that  a 
word  should  be  said  on  the  other  side. 

Granted  that  a  man  does  possess  great 
capacity,  if  (like  one  over  whose  newly- 
closed  grave  condemnation  melts  into  pity) 
he  persists  in  sleeping  all  day  and  sitting 
up  all  night,  in  stupefying  himself  with  to- 
bacco, and  maddening  himself  with  chloral, 
in  leading  a  life  wherein  all  moral  obliga- 
5 


98  GENIUS. 

tions,  all  requirements  of  common-sense,  are 
deliberately  set  aside — what  can  he  expect  ? 
Only  to  end  his  career  like  that  poor  soul 
departed,  who,  but  for  his  genius,  would  be 
utterly  condemned.  But  was  it  his  genius 
that  destroyed  him  ?  Was  it  not  his  sensu- 
ous, or,  rather,  his  sensual  nature?  his  want 
of  resistance  to  all  that  honest,  honorable 
men  resist  ?  his  eo:otistical  indifference  to  all 
the  laws  of  right  and  wrong  that  most  other 
men  obey  ?  Therefore  there  came  upon  him 
the  inevitable  end  —  the  same  retribution 
that  would  have  come  to  Tom  Smith  or 
Richard  Jones,  without  any  genius  at  all. 
Had  they  lived  the  life  he  did,  they  would 
have  died  as  he  did,  and  society  would  have 
said,  "Serve  them  right f'  Why  should  so- 
ciety be  less  severe  unto  those  to  whom  so 
much  more  is  given,  and  from  whom,  in 
common  justice,  so  much  more  should  be  re- 
quired ? 

In  speaking  of  the  aberrations  of  genius 
I   only  use  a  mere  phrase.     I  believe  the 


GENIUS.  99 

highest  form  of  genius  would  have,  and  has, 
no  aberrations  at  all.  It  is  a  li^ht  so  di- 
vine  that  no  refraction  of  its  rays  is  possible. 
So  far  from  holding  itself  superior  to  the 
common  laws  and  duties  of  human  nature, 
it  will,  I  believe,  obey  and  fulfil  them  all 
more  rigorously  and  perfectly  than  any  in- 
ferior organization.  The  greatest  man  is 
also  the  best  man.  He  not  only  sees  the 
right  much  clearer  than  his  neighbors,  but 
Iw  does  it  If,  seeing  it,  he  fails  to  do  it,  he 
merits  condemnation  as  sharply  as  his  neigh- 
bors. Nay,  more  so;  in  that  he  had  eyes 
and  would  not  see;  ears,  and  would  not 
hear. 

"Narrow  is  the  way  that  leadeth  unto 
life,"  is  as  true  of  genius  as  of  religion.  Its 
temptations  and  sorrows — like  its  rewards 
and  joys — are  keener  than  those  of  ordinary 
humanity,  and  the  sympathy  given  to  it 
should  be  in  larger  proportion.  But  only 
sympathy,  never  extenuation.  We  degrade 
and  humiliate  genius  when  we  make  for  it 


100  GENIUS. 

those  allowances  wliicli  we  refuse  to  make 
for  our  fellow-creatures  in  cjeneral. 

The  line  between  a  good  man  and  a  bad 
should  be  drawn  just  as  clearly,  whether  or 
not  he  be  a  man  of  brains.  He  must  earn 
his  honest  bread,  fulfil  his  social  and  domes- 
tic duties,  and  carry  on  his  life  with  due 
regard  to  common-sense  and  prudence,  or 
retribution  will  assuredly  follow  him.  Ay, 
and  he  will  deserve  it,  as  surely  as  the  la- 
borer who  drinks  instead  of  working;  the 
tradesman  who  neglects  his  shop;  the  pro- 
fessional man  who  lives  up  to  the  last  half- 
penny of  his  income,  and  having  brought  up 
his  family  in  idle  luxury,  dies,  and  leaves 
them  to  starvation  or  to  the  charity  of  the 
public. 

The  "  moods  "  of  genius,  so  far  from  being 
its  honor,  are  its  disgrace,  its  weakness,  its 
reproach.  So  are  its  neglects  of  the  duties 
and  beauties  of  ordinary  life.  Happily,  the 
day  is  gone  by  when  one's  ideal  portrait  of 
a  poet  was  with  bare  throat,  Byronic  tie, 


GENIUS.  101 

and  eye  "  in  a  fine  frenzy  rolling ;"  or  of  a 
literary  lady  with  uncombed  hair,  torn  or 
ragged  gown,  and  slippers  down  at  heel, 
courting  the  Muses  with  upraised  pen  in  a 
rather  dirty  hand.  Experience  has  proved 
that  a  man  of  the  highest  genius  may  be 
also  a  good  man  of  business,  accurate,  me- 
thodical, conscientious;  as  well  as  an  excel- 
lent husband  and  father,  citizen  and  friend. 
Even  with  women — as  the  world  has  found 
out — it  is  possible  both  to  write  a  book  and 
make  a  pudding;  to  study  deeply  art  or 
science,  and  yet  understand  that  not  inferior 
art  and  science  how  to  keep  house  with 
economy,  skill,  and  grace.  Incredible  as  it 
might  appear  to  the  last  generation,  some  of 
our  best  modern  authoresses  have  been  also 
the  best  of  wives  and  mothers ;  or,  failing 
this  natural  and  highest  vocation,  have  led  a 
most  useful  single  life,  deficient  in  none  of 
the  characteristics  of  genius,  except  its  eccen- 
tricities and  follies. 

That  a  man   of  genius   ought   never   to 


X02  GENIUS. 

many  is  a  very  common  creed,  and  a  true 
one  if  his  intellect  is  held  to  exempt  him 
from  all  the  duties  of  humanity ;  that  if  he 
be  a  poet,  that  great  stronghold  of  virtuous 
youth — the  "  maiden  passion  for  a  maid  " — 
may  allowably  be  frittered  away  into  half  a 
hundred  passions  for  half  a  hundred  maids; 
that  if  he  marries,  and  Heaven  gives  him 
children — the  blessed  arrows  in  the  quiver 
of  all  other  men — they  should  be  to  him 
only  arrows  that  wound  his  own  flesh,  per- 
petual worries,  burdens,  and  plagues,  who 
hinder  the  development  of  his  genius.  So 
do  his  butcher  and  baker^  who  are  so  un- 
reasonable as  to  expect  to  be  paid;  so  does 
his  wife,  if  she  dares  to  insist  that  he  shall 
not  victimize  the  household — keep  dinner 
waiting  indefinitely  while  he  finishes  a  son- 
net ;  or,  for  want  of  the  commonest  self  con- 
trol— which  we  ordinary  folk  have  to  exer- 
cise every  day  of  our  lives — appear  in  the 
bosom  of  his  family  moody,  irritable,  in- 
tolerable; until  the  hapless  mistress  of  the 


GENIUS.  103 

house  requires  to  hint  to  perplexed  guests, 
as  a  great  man's  spouse  is  said  always  to 
whisper,  "Don't  contradict  him- — we  never 
do." 

Such  a  man  may  be  a  genius,  but  he  is 
also  an  ill-tempered,  conceited  egotist,  who 
deserves  to  be  shown  no  mercy.  For  these 
aberrations  of  his  generally  arise,  not  from 
his  genius  at  all,  but  from  something  much 
more  commonplace.  It  is  curious  how  much 
a  man's  brains  are  affected  by  his  stomach. 
Even  as  many  a  sentimental  young  woman 
has  died,  not  of  a  broken  heart,  but  a 
squeezed  liver,  so  many  a  promising  young 
man — author,  artist,  or  musician — has  "per- 
ished in  his  pride,"  not  of  over- work,  which 
alone  rarely  kills  anybody,  but  of  over- 
smoking, over-dancing,  or  over-dining. 

Yet — while  refusing  to  acknowledge  black 
as  white,  to  condone  weakness,  and  pander 
to  error — let  us  speak  the  truth  in  love, 
and  never  deny  for  one  moment  that  genius, 
with  all  its  shortcomings,  is  the  one  heavenly 


104  GENIUS. 

leaven  of  human  life,  without  which  the 
whole  lump  w^ould  grow  corrupt,  worthless, 
and  abominable.  It  deserves  from  us  the 
utmost  sympathy,  the  warmest  tenderness, 
the  largest  allowance  compatible  with  jus- 
tice. It  is  entitled  to  all  reverence,  nay, 
worship;  but  this  should  be  a  clear- eyed, 
rational  worship.  That  one  man  may  do 
things  which  it  were  culpable  and  contempt- 
ible for  other  men  to  do;  that  one  woman 
may  set  herself  against  the  laws  of  God  and 
man,  and  yet  be  admired  and  loved  while 
other  M^omen  are  condemned,  is  a  creed 
which  all  just  and  righteous  people  hold  to 
be  utterly  false  and  untenable.  The  divine 
right  of  genius  is  as  true  as  the  divine  right 
of  kings.  But  how  do  we  know  that  it  is 
a  divine  right  unless  he  who  claims  it  proves 
it  by  his  life? 

And,  thank  God,  in  all  times  a  noble  mul- 
titude have  proved  and  are  proving  it.  It 
is  invidious  to  name  names — those  hitherto 
named  or  indicated  have  been  exclusively 


GENIUS.  205 

among  the  number  passed  ad  majores  ;  leav- 
ing to  the  world  open  records  by  which  they 
may  and  must  be  judged.  But  when  this 
living  generation  has  become  the  dead,  I 
think  posterity  will  find  many  instances  to 
establish  the  law  that  greatness  and  good- 
ness are,  and  ought  to  be,  identical.  That 
is,  no  fool  was  ever  a  truly  good  man ;  and 
no  bad  man,  be  his  genius  ever  so  wonder- 
ful, was  ever  a  really  great  man.  If  we  sep- 
arate what  a  man  does  from  what  he  is,  we 
grievously  and  dangerously  err. 

Finally,  I  would  say  to  all  who  consider 
themselves  "born  to  greatness,"  or  who  by 
unwise  friends  "  have  greatness  thrust  upon 
them  " — Be  a  man  first,  a  genius  afterwards. 
Make  your  life  as  complete  as  you  can ;  fuL 
fil  all  its  duties ;  deny  yourself  none  of  its 
lawful  joys.  Your  brains — be  thankful  if 
you  have  got  them,  and  make  much  of  them ! 
— were  meant,  not  as  n  shield  to  crouch  b,e^ 
hind,  but  as  a  weapon  to  fight  with  against 
the  temptations  and  difficulties  common  to 


log  GENIUS. 

all.  And  you  possess  something  which  is 
not  common  to  all — a  Holy  Grail,  which  can 
only  be  carried  by  those  of  pure  heart  and 
stainless  life. 

Genius  is  the  utmost  defence  which  man 
or  woman  can  have,  not  only  against  sin, 
but  also  against  sorrow ;  since  it  is,  for  all 
mortal  ills,  strength  and  consolation.  And 
according  as  its  possessor  is  greater  than  his 
fellows,  so  much  the  more  should  he  take 
care  that  he  loses  no  inch  of  moral  stature — 
that  the  light  which  he  bears  is  kept  burning 
clear  and  bright ;  that  he  neither  apologizes 
for  himself,  nor  asks  others  to  apologize  for 
him,  more  than  for  other  men.  He  is  at 
once  too  humble  and  too  proud. 

A  man  of  genius  is  born  to  be  both 
prophet,  priest,  and  king;  but  if  he  casts 
his  crown  to  the  ground,  if  he  prefers  the 
Circe-sty  to  the  temple,  if  he  allies  himself 
to  those  who  prophesy  one  thing  and  act 
another,  he  deserves  no  pity,  and  should  be 
shown  none;  at  least  none  greater  than  we 


GENIUS.  107 

would  show  to  any  other  miserable  sinner 
who  had  not  only  wandered  from  the  right 
road  himself,  but  helped  to  lead  othei's  astray. 

It  is  this  which  forces  us  into  sternness, 
and  compels  the  plain-spoken  justice  which 
seems  so  cruel.  We  cannot  exaggerate  the 
danger  it  is  to  the  young  to  teach  them  that 
genius  is  an  excuse  for  error,  that  an  author's 
books  are  the  condonation  of  his  life ;  that 
what  is  moral  turpitude  in  a  small  man  is 
in  a  great  man  only  a  venial  error,  nay,  per- 
haps (I  have  heard  it  thus  argued),  that  if 
he  had  been  a  better  man  he  would  not  have 
been  so  great  a  genius !  To  such  confound- 
ers  of  right  and  wrong  what  can  one  answer? 
except  to  suggest  that  the  well-known  Mil- 
tonic  Personage  who  decided,  "  Evil,  be  tliou 
my  good!"  would  probably  be  to  them  the 
most  satisfactory  type  of  transcendent  ge- 
nius. 

But  we,  who  humbly  try  to  walk  in  the 
lio-ht  as  followers  of  Him  "  with  whom  is  no 
darkness  at  all;"  we,  believing  that  genius 


108  GENIUS. 

comes  direct  from  Him,  and  is  the  exponent 
of  Him,  exact  from  it  not  a  lower  but  a 
liigher  standard  than  that  of  ordinary  men. 
We  feel  that  we  are  exalting,  not  low^ering 
it,  when  we  urge  upon  all  who  possess  it  to 
live  up  to  this  standard,  rather  than  accept 
the  pity  which  humiliates  and  the  excuses 
which  degrade.  Since  for  a  man  or  woman 
of  genius  more  than  for  any  of  us  is  written 
that  saying,  mysterious,  apparently  impossi- 
ble, and  yet  to  be  believed  in  until  death 
shall  make  it  divinely  possible :  "  Be  ye  per- 
fect, even  as  your  Father  which  is  in  heaven 
is  perfect." 


MY    SISTEE'S    GEAPES. 

A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG. 

Perhaps  you  might  not  tbink  Uncle  Dick 
a  gentleman.  Aunt  Emma  did  not,  I  know, 
thougli  she  kept  her  mind  to  herself,  being 
his  brother's  widow,  and  the  prudent  mother 
of  many  children,  who  were  Uncle  Dick's 
nearest  of  kin.  He  lived  with  them,  that  is, 
if  he  could  be  said  to  live  anywhere,  being 
always  on  the  move,  never  liking  to  stay 
long  in  one  place,  and  somewhat  restless- 
minded,  as  those  are  who  have  passed  all 
their  life  in  rambling  about  the  world.  A 
"  rolling  stone  "  he  certainly  was,  though  he 
could  scarcely  be  said  to  have  gathered  no 
moss,  as  he  had  amassed  two  fortunes,  one 
after  the  other;  had  lost  the  first,  and  was 
now  enjoying  the  second  in  his  own  harm- 
less but  rather  eccentric  way. 


IIQ  MY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

I  doubt  if  Aunt  Emma  really  liked  him ; 
but  she  was  always  very  civil  to  him ;  her 
chief  complaint  being,  that  he  never  would 
*'  take  his  position  in  the  world."  That  is,  he 
avoided  her  balls,  made  himself  scarce  at  her 
dinner-parties,  and  no  persuasion  could  ever 
induce  him  to  exhibit  his  long,  thin,  gaunt 
figure,  his  brown  hands  and  face,  in  evening 
clothes.  What  a  "guy"  he  would  have 
looked !  as  we  boys  always  agreed ;  and 
sympathized  with  Uncle  Dick  rather  than 
with  Aunt  Emma.  But  in  his  own  costume 
we  admired  him  immensely.  His  shooting- 
jacket,  knickerbockers,  and  Panama  hat  were 
to  us  the  perfection  of  comfort  and  elegance. 

As  to  his  cleverness,  that  also  was  a  dis- 
puted point — with  some  folk.  But  we  had 
never  any  doubt  at  all.  And  perhaps  we 
were  right.  *^A  fool  and  his  money  are 
soon  parted,"  says  the  proverb.  Neverthe- 
less, w^hen  they  part  to  meet  again,  that  is, 
when  a  man  can  bear  the  loss  of  one  fort- 
•ane,  and  set  to  work  and  make  another,  the 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  TOUNG.       m 

chances  are  (without  any  exaggerated  mam- 
mon-woi'ship  I  express  it)  that  he  is  not  a 
fool. 

"Yes,  I  have  really  made  two  fortunes," 
said  Uncle  Dick,  as  we  sat  by  him,  beguiling 
a  dull  day,  when  the  fish  refused  to  bite,  with 
innumerable  questions,  till  at  last  he  "  rose  " 
— like  a  trout  at  a  fly.  "How  old  was  I 
when  I  lost  the  first  one  ?  Well,  about  twenty- 
five — just  twenty-five  —  for  I  remember  it 
happened  on  my  birthday,  Michaelmas  Day." 

"Happened  all  in  one  day?"  some  of  us 
inquired. 

"Ay,  in  a  day,  an  hour,  a  minute,"  said 
Uncle  Dick,  with  his  peculiar  smile,  half  sad, 
half  droll,  as  if  he  saw  at  once  all  the  fun  and 
all  the  pathos  of  life.  "  But  it  was  not  in  the 
day  either,  it  was  in  the  middle  of  the  night. 
I  went  to  sleep  a  rich  man ;  by  daylight  I 
was  a  beggar.     Any  more  questions,  boys?" 

Of  course  w^e  rained  them  upon  him  by 
the  dozen.  He  sat  composedly  watching  his 
float  swim  down  the  stream,  and  answered 


112  MY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

none  of  us ;  Uncle  Dick  had,  when  he  chose, 
an  unlimited  capacity  for  silence. 

"Yes"  he  said  at  leno-th.  "It  was  one 
night,  in  the  middle  of  the  Atlantic,  on  the 
deck  of  a  sinking  ship.  There's  a  saying, 
boys,  about  gaining  the  whole  world  and 
losing  one's  own  soul.  Well,  I  gained  my 
soul,  though  I  lost  my  fortune.  And  it  was 
then  that  that  happened  about  my  sister's 
grapes." 

Now  Uncle  Dick  was  in  the  habit  of  talk- 
ing nonsense,  at  least  Aunt  Emma  considered 
it  such.  In  his  lonc!:  solitude  he  was  accus- 
tomed  to  let  his  thoughts  run  underground, 
as  it  were,  for  a  good  while,  when  they  would 
suddenly  crop  up  again,  and  he  would  make 
a  remark,  apropos  of  nothing,  which  greatly 
puzzled  matter-offact  people,  or  those  who 
liked  elegant  small-talk,  of  which  he  had  ab- 
solutely none. 

"  Your  sister's  grapes  V  repeated  one  of  us, 
with  great  astonishment.  "  Then  you  had  a 
sister?     Where  is  she  now?" 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNa        113 

Uncle  Dick  looked  up  at  the  blue  sky — 
intensely  blue  it  was  that  day,  as  deep  and 
measureless  as  infinity.  "  Where  is  she  ?  I 
— don't — know.  I  wish  I  did  !  But  He 
knows;  and  I  shall  find  out  some  time." 
Then  he  added  briefly,  "  My  sister  Lily  died 
of  consumption  when  she  was  fifteen,  and  I 
about  ten  years  old." 

"And  what  about  her  grapes?  Is  it  a 
story — a  true  story  ?" 

"  Quite  true — to  me,  though  all  might  not 
believe  it.  Some  might  even  laugh  at  it, 
and  I  don't  like  to  be  laucrhed  at.  No — I 
don't  mind — ^lau^hino-  can't  harm  me.  I'll 
tell  you,  boys,  if  you  fimcy  to  hear.  It  may 
be  a  good  lesson  for  some  of  you." 

We  didn't  much  care  for  "lessons,"  but 
we  liked  a  story,  so  we  begged  Uncle  Dick 
to  tell  us  this  one  "from  the  very  begin- 
ninsr." 

"  No,  not  from  the  beginning,  which  could 
benefit  neither  you  nor  me,"  said  Uncle  Dick, 
gravely.   "  I'll  take  up  my  tale  from  the  point 


114  MY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

I  mentioned,  when  I  found  myself  at  mid- 
night on  tlie  deck  of  the  Colorado^  Australian 
steamer,  bound  for  London,  fast  going  down. 
And  she  went  dow^i." 

"You  with  her?'' 

"Not  exactly,  or  how  should  I  be  here, 
sitting  quietly  fishing  —  w^hich  seems  odd, 
when  I  think  of  the  hurly-burly  of  that 
night.  It  had  come  quite  suddenly,  after  a 
long  spell  of  fair  weather,  wdiich  we  found 
so  dull  that  we  began  drinking,  smoking, 
gambling,  and  even  fighting  now  and  then; 
for  w^e  ^vere  a  rough  lot,  mostly  ^diggers.' 
These,  like  myself,  had  w^orked  a  '  claim,'  or 
half  a  claim,  at  Ballarat;  worked  it  so  w^ell 
that  they  soon  found  they  had  made  a  fort- 
une, so  determined  to  go  to  England  and 
spend  it. 

"I  thought  I  w^ould  do  the  same.  I  w\as 
quite  young,  yet  I  had  amassed  as  much 
money  as  many  a  poor  fellow,  a  clergyman, 
or  a  soldier,  or  an  author,  can  scrape  together 
in  a  lifetime.     And  I  wanted  to  spend  it  in 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        II5 

seeing  life.  Hitherto  I  had  seen  nothing  at 
all — in  civilization,  that  is — having  never 
had  the  least  bit  of  fun  till  I  ran  away  from 
home,  seven  years  ago,  and  very  little  fun 
after;  it  was  all  hard  Avork.  Now,  having 
been  so  lucky  as  to  amass  a  fortune,  I  meant 
to  enjoy  myself. 

"I  had  never  enjoyed  home  very  much. 
My  people,  good  as  they  ^vere,  were  rather 
dull  people — or  at  least  I  thought  them  so. 
They  always  bothered  me  about  ^  duty,'  till 
I  hated  the  very  sound  of  the  word.  They 
called  my  fun  mischief,  my  mischief  they  con- 
sidered a  crime.  So  I  slipped  away  from 
them,  and  after  a  letter  or  two  I  gradually 
let  them  go,  or  fancied  they  were  letting  me 
go,  and  forgot  almost  their  very  existence. 
I  might  have  been  a  -waif,  or  a  stray  drifted 
ashore,  or  dropped  from  the  clouds,  so  little 
did  I  feel  as  if  I  had  any  one  belonging  to 
me.  My  people  all  melted  out  of  my  mind  ; 
sometimes  for  weeks  I  never  once  thouGfht 
of  them,  never  remembered  that  I  liad  a 


115  MY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

father,  or  mother,  or  brothers — Lily  had  been 
my  only  sister,  and  she  died." 

Uncle  Dick  stopped  a  moment,  then  con- 
tinued. 

"  I  don't  wish,  boys,  to  put  myself  forward 
as  worse  than  I  was,  or  better.  People  find 
their  level  pretty  well  in  this  world.  It's  no 
good  either  to  puff  yourself  up  as  a  saint,  or 
go  about  crying  yourself  down  as  a  miser- 
able sinner.  In  either  case  you  think  a  great 
deal  too  much  about  yourself,  which  is  as 
harmful  a  thing  as  can  happen  to  any  human 
beino^. 

"  Certainly  I  was  no  w^orse  than  my  neigh- 
bors, and  no  better.  I  liked  ev^erybody,  and 
most  people  liked  me;  I  troubled  nobody, 
and  nobody  troubled  me.  I  meant  to  go  on 
that  principle  when  I  got  back  into  civiliza- 
tion— to  spend  my  money  and  have  my  fling. 
Possibly  I  might  run  down  to  see  ^  the  old 
folks  at  home,'  whom  we  diggers  were  rather 
fond  of  singing  about,  but  we  seldom  thought 
about  them — at  least  I  did  not.     But  they 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        II7 

formed  no  part  of  my  motives  for  coming  to 
England.  I  came  simply  and  solely  to  amuse 
myself. 

"I  had  just  turned  in  with  the  rest,  not 
drunk,  as  a  good  many  of  us  were  that  night, 
but  ^  merry.'  An  hour  after  we  turned  out, 
and  stood  facing  one  another,  and  facing 
death.  A  sudden  hurricane  had  risen,  some 
of  our  masts  had  gone  overboard ;  w^e  had 
sprung  a  leak,  and,  work  as  we  might,  the 
captain  said  he  believed  we  should  go  to 
pieces  before  morning.  He  had  been  drunk, 
too,  which  perhaps  accounted  for  our  disaster 
in  a  good,  sound  ship  and  the  safe  open  sea; 
but  he  was  sober  enough  now.  He  did  his 
best,  and,  when  hope  was  over,  said  he  should 
*go  to  the  bottom  with  his  ship.'  And  he 
went.  I  took  his  watch  to  his  widow;  he 
gave  it  me  just  before  he  jumped  overboard, 
poor  fellow ! 

"  Well,  boys,  and  what  was  I  going  to  tell 
you?"  said  Uncle  Dick,  drawing  his  long 
brown  hand  across  his  forehead.   "  Oh,  about 


118  MY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

the  ship  Colorado  going  down,  and  all  the 
poor  wretches  fighting  for  their  lives,  in  the 
boats  or  out  of  them,  which  w^as  about  an 
equal  chance.  "We  could  just  see  one  another 
by  tlie  starlight,  or  the  white  gleam  of  the 
waves;  groups  of  struggling  men — happily 
there  was  not  a  woman  on  board — some 
paralyzed  and  silent,  others  shrieking  with 
terror;  some  sobbing  and  praying,  others 
only  waiting.  For  heaven,  to  wdiich  we  all 
were  straight  going,  seemed  to  be  the  last 
thing  we  ever  thought  of.  We  only  thought 
of  life — dear  life! — our  own  lives,  nobody 
else's. 

"People  say  that  a  sliipwreck  brings  out 
human  nature  as  nothing  else  does — ghastly 
human  nature  in  all  its  brutality ;  every  man 
for  himself,  and  God — no,  not  God,  but  the 
devil,  for  us  all.  I  found  it  so.  It  was 
horrible  to  see  those  men,  old,  young,  and 
middle-aged  ;  some  clothed,  some  half  naked, 
but  all  clinging  to  their  bags  full  of  nuggets, 
which  they  had  tied  round  their  waists,  or 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        II9 

held  in  their  hands,  eager  to  save  their  gold, 
until  it  gradually  dawned  upon  some  of  the 
feebler  among  them  that  they  would  hardly 
save  themselves.  Then  they  no  longer  tried 
to  conceal  their  money,  but  offered  a  quarter, 
a  half,  two  thirds  of  it,  to  anybody  who 
would  help  them.  Nobody  did.  Everybody 
had  but  one  person  to  think  of — himself. 

"For  me,  I  was  a  young  fellow — young 
and  strong.  I  had  never  faced  death  before, 
and  it  felt — well,  strange  !  I  was  not  exact- 
ly frightened,  but  I  was  awed.  ...  I  turned 
from  the  selfish,  brutal,  cowardly  wretches 
around  me;  they  had  shown  themselves  in 
their  true  colors,  and  I  was  disgusted  at  my- 
self for  having  put  up  with  them  so  long.  I 
didn't  like  even  to  go  to  the  bottom  with 
such  a  miserable  lot.  In  truth,  it  felt  hard 
enough  to  go  to  the  bottom  at  all. 

"  The  biggest  of  my  nuggets  I  always  car- 
ried in  a  belt  round  my  waist,  but  the  rest 
of  my  ^  fortune '  was  in  my  bag.  Most  of  us 
had  these  bags,  and  tried  to  get  with  them 


120  MY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

into  the  boats,  whicli  was  impossible.  So 
some  had  to  let  them  go  overboard,  but  oth- 
ers, shrieking  and  praying,  refused  to  be 
parted  from  their  '  luggage,'  as  they  called  it. 
They  were  not  parted,  for  both  soon  went  to 
the  bottom  together.  I  was  not  inclined 
for  that  exactly,  and  so,  after  a  few  minutes' 
thought,  I  left  my  bag  behind." 

"How  much  was  there  in  it?"  some  one 
asked. 

"I  don't  know  exactly, but  I  guess" — he 
still  used  a  Yankee  phrase  here  and  there — 
"somewhere  about  seven  or  eight  thousand 
pounds." 

We  boys  drew  a  long  breath.  "  What  a 
lot  of  money !  And  it  all  went  to  the  bot- 
tom of  the  sea  ?" 

"  Yes.  But,  as  the  Bible  says,  what  will 
not  a  man  give  "in  exchange  for  his  soul"? 
Or  his  life — for  my  soul  troubled  me  mighty 
little  just  then;  I  hardly  knew  I  had  one 
till  I  lost  my  money.  So,  you  see,  it  was  a 
good  riddance,  perhaps." 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.         121 

We  stared — Uncle  Dick  talked  so  very 
oddly  sometimes.  And  then  we  begged  him 
to  continue  his  story. 

'^  Well,  I  was  standing  quiet,  waiting  my 
turn  to  jump  into  the  boat — the  last  boat — 
for  two  had  been  filled  and  swamped.  Be- 
ing young,  it  seemed  but  right  to  let  the 
older  fellows  go  first,  and,  besides,  I  wanted 
to  stick  by  the  captain  as  long  as  I  could. 
He,  I  told  you,  determined  to  stick  by  his 
ship,  and  went  down  with  her.  He  had  just 
given  me  his  watch  and  his  last  message  to 
his  wife,  and  I  was  trying,  as  I  said,  to  keep 
quiet,  with  all  my  wits  about  me.  But  I 
seemed  to  be  half  dreaming,  or  as  if  1  saw 
myself  like  another  person  and  felt  rather 
sorry  for  myself,  to  be  drowned  on  my 
twenty-fifth  birthday — drowned  just  when  I 
had  made  my  fortune,  and  was  going  home 
to  spend  it. 

"  Home !  The  word,  even,  had  not 
crossed  my  lips  or  mind  for  years.  As  I 
said  it,  or  thought  it — I  can't  remember 
6 


122  ^Y  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

which — all  of  a  sudden  I  seemed  to  hear  my 
mother's  voice,  clear  and  distinct  through  all 
the  noise  of  the  storm.  Boys,  what  do  you 
think  she  said?  ^ Hicliard^  how  could  you 
take  your  sister'' s  grapes  V 

"  It  flashed  upon  me  like  lightning — some- 
thing that  happened  when  I  was  only  ten 
years  old,  and  yet  I  remembered  it  like  yes- 
terday. I  saw  myself,  young  wretch  !  with 
the  bunch  of  grapes  in  my  hand,  and  my 
mother  with  her  grave,  sad  eyes,  as,  passing 
through  the  dressing-room  into  my  sister's 
bedroom,  she  caught  me  in  the  act  of  steal- 
ino:  them,  I  could  almost  hear  throudi  the 
open  door  poor  Lily's  short,  feeble  cough — 
she  died  two  days  after.  The  grapes  had 
been  sent  her  by  some  friend — she  had  so 
many  friends.  I  knew  where  they  were 
kept;  I  had  climbed  up  to  the  shelf,  and 
eaten  them  all. 

"Many  a  selfish  thing  had  I  done,  both 
before  I  left  home  and  afterwards;  why 
should  this  little  thing,  long  forgotten,  come 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        123 

back  now  ?  Perhaps,  because  I  was  never 
punished  for  it ;  my  mother,  who  at  another 
time  might  have  boxed  my  ears  or  taken  me 
to  father  to  be  whipped,  did  nothing,  said 
nothing,  except  those  few  words  of  sad  re- 
proach, ^  How  could  you  tahe  your  sister'' s 
grapes  r 

"I  heard  them  through  the  horrible  tu- 
mult of  winds  and  waves  and  poor  souls 
struggling  for  life.  My  life,  what  had  I 
made  of  it  ?  If  I  went  to  the  bottom  of  the 
sea,  I  and  all  my  money,  who  would  miss 
me?  Avho  would  care?  Hardly  even  my 
mother.  If  she  ever  heard  of  my  death  — 
this  terrible  death  to-night — she  might  drop 
a  tear  or  two,  but  nothing  like  the  tears 
she  shed  over  my  sister,  who,  in  her  short 
life,  had  been  everybody's  comfort  and  joy. 
While  I— 

"^Mother,'  I  cried  out  loud,  as  if  she 
could  hear  me  there,  many  thousand  miles 
off,  *  Mother,  forgive  me,  and  I'll  never  do  it 
any  more.' 


124  ^^Y   SISTER'S   GRAPES. 

"I  had  not  said  this  when  I  was  ten  years 
old  and  took  the  grapes,  but  I  said  it — sobbed 
it  —  at  twenty  -  five,  when  the  ^  it '  implied 
many  a  selfishness,  many  a  sin,  that  my 
mother  never  knew.  Yet  the  mere  words 
seemed  to  relieve  me,  and  when,  directly  af- 
terwards, some  one  called  out  from  the  boat, 
^  Jump  in,  Dick;  now's  your  turn  !'  I  jumped 
in  to  take  my  chance  of  life  with  the  rest. 

"  It  was  given  me.  I  was  among  the 
eighteen  that  held  on  till  we  were  picked 
up,  almost  skin  and  bone,  and  one  of  us  rav- 
ing mad  from  thirst,  by  a  homeward-bound 
ship,  and  laiided  safely  in  England.  No, 
boys,  don't  question  me,  I  won't  tell  you 
about  that  week;  I  cari'tr 

It  was  not  often  Uncle  Dick  said  "I 
can't ;"  indeed,  it  was  one  of  his  queer  say- 
ings that  canH  was  a  word  no  honest  or 
brave  lad  ought  to  have  in  his  dictionary. 
We  turned  away  our  eyes  from  him — he 
seemed  not  to  like  being  looked  at — and 
were  silent. 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        125 

"  Well,  I  landed,  and  found  nayself  walk- 
ing London  streets,  not  the  rich,  healthy,  jol- 
ly young  fellow  who  had  come  to  have  his 
fling  there,  but  a  poor,  shattered  wretch,  al- 
most in  rags,  and  just  ^  a  bag  of  bones.'  All 
that  remained  of  my  fortune  were  the  few 
nuggets  which  I  had  sewed  into  my  belt.  I 
turned  them,  not  without  some  difficulty,  into 
food  and  cjothing  of  the  commonest  kind,  to 
make  my  money  last  as  long  as  I  could.  I 
did  not  want  to  come  home  quite  a  beggar; 
if  I  had  been,  I  should  certainly  never  have 
come  home  at  all. 

"By  mere  chance, for  I  had  altogether  for- 
gotten times  and  seasons,  the  day  I  came 
home  was  a  Christmas  mornins:.  The  bells 
were  ringing,  and  all  the  good  folk  going  to 
church — my  mother,  too,  of  course.  We  met 
at  the  garden  gate.  She  didn't  know  me, 
not  the  least  in  the  world,  but  just  bowed, 
thinking  it  was  a  stranger  coming  to  call, 
till  I  said  ^  Mother,'  and  then — 

"  Well,  boys,  that's  neither  here  nor  there. 


126  ^Y  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

It's  a  commonplace  saying,  but  one  can't  hear 
it  too  often,  or  remember  it  too  well — that, 
whatever  else  we  have,  we  never  can  have 
but  one  mother.  If  she's  a  good  one,  make 
the  most  of  her;  if  a  middling  one,  put 
up  with  her ;  if  a  bad  one,  let  her  alone,  and 
hold  your  tongue.  You  know  whether  I 
have  any  need  to  hold  my  tongue  about 
your  grandmother. 

"  But  I  can't  talk  about  her,  or  about  that 
Christmas  Day.  We  did  not  go  to  church, 
and  I  doubt  if  we  ate  much  Christmas  din- 
ner; but  we  talked  and  talked,  straight  on, 
up  to  ten  o'clock  at  night,  when  she  put  me 
to  bed,  and  tucked  me  in,  just  as  if  I  had 
been  a  little  baby.  Oh,  how  pleasant  it 
was  to  sleep  in  sheets  again — clean,  fresh 
sheets — and  have  one's  mother — one's  very 
own  mother — settling  the  pillow  and  taking 
away  the  candle ! 

"My  room  happened  to  be  that  same 
dressing-room  behind  the  nursery  where 
Lily  died.     I  could  see  the  shelf  where  the 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        127 

grapes  had  stood,  and  the  chair  I  climbed  to 
reach  them ;  with  a  sort  of  childish  awe  I 
recalled  everything. 

"^Mother/  I  said,  catching  her  by  the 
gown  as  she  said  good-night  and  kissed  me, 
*tell  me  one  thing.  What  were  you  doing 
on  my  last  birthday  ?  That  is,  if  you  re- 
membered it  at  all.' 

"  She  smiled.  *  As  if  mothers  ever  forget 
their  boys'  birthdays !'  and  then  a  very 
gfave  look  came  into  her  face. 

"'My  dear,  I  w^as  clearing  out  this  room, 
turning  it  into  a  bedroom  for  any  stray  vis- 
itor, little  thinking  the  first  would  be  you. 
But  I  did  think  of  you,  for  I  called  to  mind 
a  naughty  thing  you  once  did  here,  in  this 
very  room.* 

" '  And  you  said,  over  again,  Hoxo  could  I 
take  my  sister'' s  grapes  ?  I  heard  it,  mother, 
heard  it  in  the  middle  of  the  Atlantic'  And 
then  I  told  her  my  story. 

"Now,  boys,  I  ask  nobody  to  believe  it, 
but  I  believe  it  myself,  and  my  mother  be- 


128  ^lY  SISTER'S  GRAPES. 

lieved  it  to  the  day  of  her  death.  It  made 
her  happy  to  think  that  in  some  mysterious 
way  she  had  helped  to  save  me,  as  mothers 
never  know  how,  when,  and  where  some 
word  of  theirs  may  save  their  wandering 
sons. 

"  For  I  was  a  wanderer  still.  I  stayed 
with  her  only  a  month,  while  my  nuggets 
lasted,  and  then  I  worked  my  passage  back 
to  Australia,  and  began  again  in  the  same 
way,  and  yet  a  new  way.  New  in  one  thing, 
at  least,  that  every  Sunday  of  my  life  I  wrote 
to  my  mother.  And  when  at  length  I  came 
home,  too  late  for  her !  it  was  not  quite  too 
late  for  the  rest  of  you.  Bad  is  the  best, 
maybe,  but  I've  tried  to  do  my  best  for  you 
all." 

"  Oh,  Uncle  Dick !"  For  he  had  been  as 
good  as  a  father  to  some  of  us,  sent  us  to 
school  and  to  college,  and,  what  we  liked  a 
great  deal  better,  taken  us  fishing  and  shoot- 
ing, and  given  us  no  i end  of  fun. 

"  So,  boys,"  said  he,  smiling  at  our  demon- 


A  STORY  FOR  OLD  AND  YOUNG.        129 

stratious  of  affection — and  yet  he  liked  to  be 
loved,  we  were  sure  of  tliat — "  you  Lave  a 
sneakino;  kindness  for  me  after  all  ?  And 
you  don't  think  nie  altogether  a  villain,  even 
though  I  did  once  take  my  sister's  grapes?" 

Note. — It  may  interest  readers  to  know  that  this  story  is 
really  "  founded  on  foct ;''  one  of  those  inexplicable  facts 
that  we  sometimes  meet  with,  and  which  arc  stranger  than 
anything  we  authors  invent  in  our  fictions. 

6* 


ON  SISTERHOODS. 

"I  slept,  and  dreamed  that  life  was  Beauty; 
I  woke,  and  found  that  life  was  Duty." 

This  couplet  was  the  favorite  axiom  of  a 
dear  old  friend  of  mine,  and  the  keynote  of 
her  noble  and  sorely-tried  life  of  over  eighty 
years.  As  I  sit  writing,  watching  the  same 
hills  and  the  same  beautiful  river  that  she 
watched  until  she  died,  it  seems  a  fitting 
motto  for  a  few  words  I  have  lonsr  wished  to 
say,  and  which  a  chance  incident  has  lately 
revived  in  my  mind. 

A  young  lady,  who  had  been  for  some 
time  a  probationer  (or  whatever  the  term 
may  be)  in  one  of  those  Anglican  Sisterhoods 
which  their  friends  so  much  admire,  their 
foes  so  sharply  condemn,  wrote  to  me  that 
she  was  about  to  make  her  "profession"  there, 
and  wished  me  to  be  present  at  the  "  service." 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  131 

These  two  words  were  my  only  clew  as  to 
what  kind  of  ceremony  it  would  be,  and  what 
sort  of  "  profession  "  the  girl  was  about  to 
make.  A  *'  girl "  she  still  was  to  me,  for  I 
had  held  her  in  my  arms  w^hen  only  a  day 
old  ;  but  in  truth  she  was  a  woman  of  thirty, 
quite  capable  of  judging,  deciding,  and  act- 
ing for  herself.  She  had  had  a  hard  life,  was 
claimed  by  no  very  near  ties  or  duties,  and 
I  felt  a  satisfaction  in  thinking  she  had  the 
courage  to  choose  a  decided  vocation ;  which 
would  be  to  her  at  once  a  refuge  and  an  oc- 
cupation, for  the  Sisterhood  bore  the  name 
of  the  Orphanage  of  Mercy.  Whatever  her 
life  there  might  be,  it  could  not  be  an  idle 
life.  I  had  a  certain  sympathy  with  it,  which 
prompted  me  at  once  to  say  I  would  go ;  and 
I  went. 

It  was  one  of  those  gray,  wet  summer 
days  which  always  strike  one  with  a  melan- 
choly nn naturalness,  like  a  human  existence 
lost  or  wasted.  As  I  stood  in  the  soaking 
rain  before  a  large  monastic  building,  the 


132  ^N  SISTERHOODS. 

door  of  wliicli  was  opened  by  a  nunlike 
portress,  I  was  conscious  ofasligLt  sensation 
of  pain  at  the  difference  between  this  home 
and  a  bright,  haj)py  English  home.  But  not 
all  homes  are  bright  and  happy,  and  not  all 
— nay,  very  few — wives  and  mothers  have 
the  placid,  contented  smile  of  the  Sister 
who  came  to  w^elcome  me  in  the  parlor — a 
regular  convent-parlor  or  "parloir,"  which  is 
what  the  word  originally  came  from. 

She  explained  that  Sister  — —  (iny  girl) 
was  "in  retreat,"  and  could  see  no  one  till 
after  the  service ;  and  then  we  stood  talking 
for  several  minutes  about  her  and  about  the 
Orphanage.  The  Sister's  dress,  manner,  and, 
indeed,  the  whole  atmosphere  of  the  place, 
were  so  essentially  monastical,  that  I  in- 
voluntarily put  the  question,  "Are  you  a 
Catholic?" 

"  Not  a  Roman  Catholic,"  she  answered, 
after  a  slight  hesitation.  "  We  belong  to 
the  Catholic  Church  — the  Church  of  Eng- 
land." 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  I33 

Verily  —  and  I  will  add  happily  —  our 
mother  Church  of  England  shelters  under 
her  broad  wings  so  many  diverse  broods ! — 
would  that  they  could  keep  from  pecking 
one  another ! 

When  I  found  myself  in  the  chapel,  it 
seemed  at  first  exactly  like  one  of  those 
chapels  that  we  see  in  Norman  cathedrals. 
The  high  altar  was  brilliantly  lighted,  and 
adorned  w^ith  white  lilies,  the  faint,  sweet 
smell  of  which  penetrated  everywhere  and 
mingled  with  that  of  incense.  But  there 
w^ere  none  of  those  paltry  or  puei'ile  images 
that  abound  in  Roman  Catholic  churches; 
nothing  except  the  large  crucifix,  the  sign  of 
all  Christians,  to  which  no  good  Christian 
ought  to  object.  Protestant  —  in  the  sense 
of  Luther  and  Calvin,  and  of  modern  Low 
Church  and  Presbyterianism — the  place  cer- 
tainly was  not;  but  no  unbiassed  eye-wit- 
ness could  have  seen  any  tokens  of  Mariola- 
try  or  saint-worship  in  it  or  in  the  service 
held  there. 


134  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

Gradually  the  whole  chapel  became  filled 
with  Sisters,  who  I  saw  were  divided  into 
three  classes  —  the  black -veiled,  the  white- 
veiled,  and  the  novices,  or  probationers. 
These  latter  wore  the  dress  of  ordinary  young 
ladies,  while  the  Sisters  were  undeniably 
nuns;  in  their  plain  black  gowns  and  white 
or  black  veils  of  some  soft  -  falling,  close-fit- 
ting material  —  a  costume  as  becoming  and 
comfortable  as  any  woman  can  wear.  It 
seemed  to  suit  all  the  faces,  young  and  old, 
and  some  were  quite  elderly  and  not  over- 
beautiful;  but  every  one  had  that  peculiar 
expression  of  mingled  sweetness  and  peace 
which  —  let  the  contemptuous  world  say 
what  it  will  —  I  have  found  oftener  on  the 
faces  of  nuns  —  Catholic  Petites  Soeurs  des 
Pauvres  or  Protestant  Sisters  of  Charity — 
than  among  any  other  body  of  women  that 
I  know;  a  fact  which  I  neither  attempt  to 
account  for  nor  argue  from,  but  merely  state 
it  as  such. 

After  a  somewhat  long  pause  of  waiting, 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  135 

and  reading  of  the  printed  service  which  was 
given  us,  there  was  a  slight  stir  and  turning 
of  heads.  A  distant  chanting  of  female 
voices  (some,  I  own,  a  trifle  out  of  tune) 
announced  the  procession — very  like  the  pro- 
cessions w^ith  which  we  are  familiar  in  for- 
eign churches,  save  that  there  were  only  two 
priests  and  no  acolytes.  The  rest  were  Sis- 
ters ;  except  two  young  ladies  dressed  in  full 
bridal  costume,  who,  with  a  motherly  nun 
behind  them,  came  and  knelt  before  the  al- 
tar. Neither  looked  excited  nor  agitated; 
and  when  the  service  began  there  followed 
a  series  of  solemn  questions,  asked  and  an- 
swered, just  like  a  marriage  ceremony,  in 
which  I  recognized  the  voice  of  m/y  girl,  per- 
fectly natui'al,  collected,  and  firm. 

The  chaplain,  or  priest  —  his  vestments 
were  very  like  a  Koman  Catholic  priest's, 
but  every  word  he  uttered  might  liave  come 
from  an  evangelical  pulpit — calling  each  by 
her  Christian  name  —  I,  as  her  godmother, 
had  given  my  girl  hers,  and  would  liave  been 


136  ^N  SISTERHOODS. 

loatli  she  should  change  it  —  asked  "if  she 
were  joining  this  community  of  her  own  free 
will,  if  she  would  endow  it  with  her  worldly 
goods,  and  take  the  vow  of  obedience  to  its 
rules?"  I  heard  no  other  vow  except  that 
something  was  said  about  chastity  as  "the 
spouse  of  Christ."  To  all  these  was  an- 
swered distinctly,  "I  will,  God  being  my 
helper."  Afterwards  the  dress  of  each — 
gown,  veil,  and  cross  —  was  brought  to  the 
altar  and  blessed  in  a  few  simple  words,  and 
the  two  girls  went  out,  during  the  singing 
of  a  hymn,  to  reappear  presently  in  another 
procession,  with  their  secular  dress  forever 
laid  aside.  There  was  no  cutting-off  of  hair, 
or  prostration  under  a  black  pall,  as  in  Cath- 
olic countries — merely  the  change  of  dress. 

But  that  was  very  great.  In  the  young 
nun  who  walked  up  to  the  altar,  taper  in 
hand,  I  hardly  recognized  my  girl,  so  spirit- 
ualized was  her  honest  face  by  the  pict- 
uresqueness  of  the  close  white  veil,  and  by 
lier  expression  of  entire  content  —  as  sweet 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  I37 

as  that  I  have  seeu  on  some  young  brides' 
features  as  they  went  down  the  aisle  to  the 
church  door. 

"  Are  you  content  ?"  I  said,  as,  when  ser- 
vice was  ended,  she  came  to  me,  in  a  large 
room,  where  Sisters,  clergy,  and  friends  Avere 
standing  about,  taking  tea  or  coffee,  and 
chattins:  in  a  most  mundane  and  secular 
fashion.     "Are  you  really  satisfied?" 

"  Perfectly,"  she  answered ;  and  kissed  me 
and  her  other  friends  and  kindred,  not  with- 
out emotion,  but  with  no  excitement  or  ex- 
altation ;  indeed,  she  was  the  last  person  in 
the  world  to  be  what  the  French  call  exaltee^ 
or  to  give  way  to  romantic  impulses  of  any 
kind.  "But  you  must  come  to  speak  to 
the  Mother.  I  do  so  want  you  to  see  our 
Mother.     It  is  she  who  has  done  it  all." 

By  which  was  meant  the  Orphanage — es- 
tablished almost  entirely  by  this  lady,  as  I 
afterwards  learned.  And  when  I  saw  the 
Mother  I  was  not  surprised. 

Some  people  strike  you  at  once  with  their 


138  ON  SISTERHOODS.    ' 

personality,  physical  and  mental,  which  car- 
ries with  it  an  influence  that,  you  feel,  must 
affect  every  one  within  their  reach.  I  have 
never  seen  any  one  in  whom  this  individual- 
ity was  more  strong,  except  perhaps  Cardi- 
nal Newman,  of  whom  the  Mother  vividly 
reminded  me.  Tall,  stately,  and  beautiful — 
the  beauty  of  middle  age  just  becoming  old 
age — of  few  words,  but  with  a  clasp  of  the 
hand  and  a  smile  beyond  all  speaking,  I 
could  understand  how  the  Mother  was  just 
the  woman  to  be  head  of  a  community  like 
this,  ruling  it  as  much  by  her  influence  as 
her  authority. 

I  had  some  talk  with  her,  and  also  with 
the  officiating  priest  —  chaplain,  "spiritual 
director,"  the  anti-Ritualists  would  call  him; 
but,  if  a  wolf  in  sheep's  clothing,  he  looked 
the  most  harmless  of  vulpine  foes,  as  he 
stood  sipping  liis  coffee  and  chatting  to  his 
cheerful  flock,  who  fluttered  around  as  wom- 
en always  will  round  a  clergyman,  even  in 
"the  world."     This,  though  inside  a  quasi- 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  139 

nunnery,  seemed  a  very  merry  world,  and  all 
the  nuns  went  about  conversing  much  as 
people  do  at  afternoon  teas  and  garden-par- 
ties, except  that  there  was  not  one  who  had 
that  jaded,  bored,  or  cross  look  so  often  seen 
on  the  faces  of  the  rich  and  prosperous  Mdio 
have  nothing  to  do. 

"And  now  you  must  come  and  see  our 
orphans.  We  have  over  two  hundred.  We 
take  them  in  from  anywhere  or  anybody; 
no  recommendation  needed  except  that  they 
are  orphans,  and  destitute.  We  feed,  clothe, 
and  educate  them  until  they  are  old  enough 
to  work,  and  then  we  find  them  work,  chief- 
ly as  domestic  servants.  Come  and  look  at 
them." 

Oi'phanages  are  at  best  a  sad  sight:  the 
poor  little  souls  seem  such  automatons, 
brought  up  by  line  and  rule,  just  No.  1,  No. 
2,  No.  3 — of  no  importance  to  anybody.  But 
this  class  —  a  sewing- class,  I  think  it  was, 
chiefly  of  big  girls,  who  rose  with  bright 
faces  and  showed  their  work  with  intelli- 


140  ^N  SISTERHOODS. 

gent  pride  —  was  something  quite  differ- 
ent. More  different  still  was  the  long  pro- 
cession of  "  little  ones  "  which  we  met  as  it 
was  going  out  of  the  chapel  to  supper  and 
bed. 

"  Children,  don't  you  know  me?'  said  the 
new-made  Sister,  stopping  the  three  smallest 
— such  tiny  dots ! — and  calling  them  by  their 
Christian  names.  They  hesitated  a  minute, 
then,  with  a  cry  of  delight,  sprang  right  into 
her  arms.  She  held  them  there:  one  over 
her  shoulder,  the  other  two  clinging  to  her 
gown>  Three  orphans  and  a  solitary  w^oman, 
husbandless,  childless,  laughing  and  toying 
together,  kissing  and  kissed  —  they  made  a 
group  so  pretty,  so  happy,  so  full  of  God's 
great  mercy,  compensation,  that  it  brought 
the  tears  to  one's  eyes. 

I  Avent  away  after  having  gone  over  the 
whole  establishment ;  w'ent  away  feeling  that 
there  w^as  a  great  deal  to  be  said  —  much 
more  than  we  Protestants  till  lately  had  any 
idea  of — on  behalf  of  Sisterhoods. 


ON   SISTERHOODS.  141 

"  I  slept,  and  dreamed  tliat  life  was  Beauty ; 
I  woke,  and  found  that  life  was  Duty." 

Alas !  this  is  the  experience  of  almost  every 
woman  who  has  any  womanly  qualities  in 
her  at  all,  long  before  she  reaches  old  age ! 
Hov/  to  combine  the  two — how  to  arrange 
her  life  so  that  duty  shall  not  draw  all  the 
beauty  out  of  it,  while  mere  beauty  shall  al- 
ways be  held  subservient  to  duty  —  this  is 
the  crucial  test,  the  great  secret  which  must 
be  learned  during  those  years — most  painful 
years  they  often  are! — between  the  first 
passing  away  of  youth  and  the  quiet  accept- 
ance of  inevitable  old  age.  Should  age  come 
and  find  the  lesson  unlearned,  it  is  too  late. 

Marriage  is  supposed  to  be  the  great  end 
of  a  woman's  being,  and  so  it  is.  Few  will 
deny  that  the  perfect  life  is  the  married  life 
— the  happy  married  life — though  I  have 
heard  people  say  that  "  any  husband  is  better 
than  none."  Perhaps  so ;  in  the  sense  of  his 
being  a  sort  of  domestic  Attila,  a  "  scourge 
of  God"  to  "whip  the  offending  Adam"  out 


142  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

of  a  woman  and  turn  her  into  an  angel,  as 
the  wives  of  some  bad  husbands  seem  to  be- 
come. But,  in  truth,  any  wife  whose  hus- 
band is  not  altogether  vicious  has  a  better 
chance  of  being  educated  into  perfection, 
through  that  necessary  altruism  which  it  is 
the  mystery  of  marriage  to  teach,  than  a 
woman  sunk  in  luxurious  single-blessedness, 
who  has  no  work  to  do,  and  nobody  to  do  it 
for,  and  so  seems  almost  compelled  into  that 
fatal  selfism  which  is  at  the  root  of  half  the 
evils  and  miseries  of  existence. 

Thus  we  come  back  to  the  great  question, 
becoming  more  difficult  as  we  advance  in — 
shall  we  call  it  civilization  ?  Those  women 
who  do  not  marry,  what  are  they  to  do  with 
their  lives  ? 

For  some  of  them  Fate  decides,  often  se- 
verely enough,  laying  on  them  the  sacred 
burden  of  aged  parents,  or  helpless  brothers 
and  sisters,  or  orphan  nephews  and  nieces. 
Others,  left  without  natural  duties  or  ties, 
have  the  strength  to  make  such  for  them- 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  143 

selves.  I  know  no  position  more  happy, 
more  useful  (and  therefore  happy),  than  that 
of  a  single  woman  who,  having  inherited  or 
earned  sufficient  money  and  position,  has 
courage  to  assume  the  status  and  responsi- 
bilities of  a  married  woman.  She  has,  ex- 
cept the  husband,  all  the  advantages  of  the 
matronly  position,  and  almost  none  of  its 
drawbacks.  So  much  lies  in  her  power  to 
do  unhindered,  especially  the  power  of  doing 
good.  She  can  be  a  friend  to  the  friendless 
and  a  mother  to  the  orphan  ;  she  can  fill 
her  house  with  happy  guests,  after  the  true 
Christian  type — the  guests  that  cannot  re- 
pay her  for  her  kindness.  Being  free  to  dis- 
pose of  her  time  and  her  labor,  she  can  be  a 
good  neighbor,  a  good  citizen — whether  or 
not  she  ever  attains  the  doubtful  privilege 
of  female  sufi*rage.  Her  worldly  goods,  her 
time,  and  her  afi*ections  are  exclusively  her 
own  to  bestow  wisely  and  well.  Solitary, 
to  a  certain  extent,  her  life  must  always 
be;  but  it  need  never  be  a  morbid,  selfish, 


144  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

or  dreary  life.  I  think  it  miglit  be  all  the 
better  for  our  girls  of  this  generation,  which 
understands  the  duties  and  destinies  of  wom- 
en a  little  better  than  the  last  one,  if  we 
were  to  hold  up  to  them — since  they  cannot 
all  be  wives  and  mothers — this  ideal  of  a 
happy  single  life,  which  lies  before  any  girl 
who  either  inhei'its  an  independence,  or  has 
the  courage  and  ability  to  earn  one. 

But  such  cases  are,  and  must  always  be, 
exceptional.  The  great  bulk  of  unmarried 
w^omen  are  a  very  helpless  race,  either  ham- 
pered with  duties,  or  seeking  feebly  for  duties 
that  do  not  come ;  miserably  overwoiked,  or 
disgracefully  idle;  piteously  dependent  on 
male  relations,  or  else  angrily  vituperating 
the  opposite  sex  for  their  denied  rights  or 
perhaps  not  undeserved  wrongs.  Between 
these  two  lies  a  medium  class,  silent  and  suf- 
fering, who  has  just  enough  money  to  save 
them  from  the  necessity  of  earning  it,  just 
enoucfh  brains  and  heart  to  make  them  feel 
the  blankness  of  their  life  without  strength 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  145 

to  obviate  it — to  strike  out  a  career  for  them- 
selves, and  cheat  Fate  by  making  it  neither 
a  sad  nor  useless  one.  It  is  for  these  stray 
sheep,  sure  to  wander  if  left  alone,  but  safe 
enough  in  a  flock  with  a  steady  shepherd  to 
guide  them,  that  I  open  up  for  consideration 
the  question  of  Sisterhoods. 

Not  that  I  defend  the  medisGval  system 
of  nunneries,  where,  from  a  combination  of 
motives,  good  and  bad,  religious  and  w^orld- 
ly,  girls  were  separated  from  all  family  ties 
and  dedicated  to  the  service  of  God.  It  can- 
not be  too  strongly  insisted  that  the  family 
life  is  the  first  and  most  blessed  life,  and  that 
family  duties,  in  whatever  shape  they  come, 
ousrht  never  to  be  set  aside.  Also  that  the 
service  of  God  is  also  best  fulfilled  throu2:li 
the  service  of  man — the  utilizincj  of  an  aim- 
less  existence  for  the  good  of  others.  It  is 
this  which  constitutes  the  strength  and  the 
charm  of  a  community,  for  such  work  can 
best  be  done  in  communities.  The  mass 
of  w^omen  are  not  clever  enougli,  or  brave 
7 


146  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

enough,  to  cany  out  anything  single-handed. 
Like  sheep, they  follow  the  leader;  they  will 
do  excellent  work  if  any  one  will  find  it  for 
them,  but  they  cannot  find  it  for  themselves. 
How  continually  do  we  hear  the  cry,  "I 
want  something  to  do;"  "Tell,  me  what  to 
do,  and  I'll  do  it !"  as  she  very  likely  would 
if  shown  how. 

Of  course,  a  really  strong  woman  would 
never  need  this;  she  would  under  no  circum- 
stances be  idle — if  she  could  not  find  work, 
she  would  make  it.  But  for  one  like  this, 
capable  of  organizing,  guiding,  ruling,  there 
are  hundreds  and  thousands  of  women  fitted 
only  to  obey ;  to  whom  the  mere  act  of  obe- 
dience is  a  relief,  because  it  saves  them  from 
responsibility.  To  them  a  corporate  institu- 
tion, headed  by  such  a  one  as  the  Mother 
of  that  Orphanage  of  Mercy  I  visited,  is  an 
actual  boon.  It  protects  them  from  them- 
selves—  their  weak,  vacillating,  uncertain 
selves — puts  them  under  line  and  rule,  gives 
them  the  shelter  of  numbers  and  the  strencrth 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  147 

of  a  common  interest.  It  is  astonishing  what 
good  can  be  done  by  a  combined  body,  who, 
as  individuals,  would  have  done  no  good  at 
all. 

An  institution  Avhich  would  absorb  the 
w\iifs  and  strays  of — let  us  coin  a  word,  and 
say  gentlewomanhood — ladies  of  limited 
income  and  equally  limited  capacity,  yet  very 
good  women  so  far  as  they  go ;  which  could 
take  possession  of  them,  income  and  all,  sav- 
ing and  utilizing  both  it  and  themselves — 
would  be  a  real  boon  to  society.  For  what 
does  not  society  suffer  from  these  helpless 
excrescences  upon  it — women  w^ith  no  ties, 
no  duties,  no  ambition — who  drone  away  a 
hopeless,  selfish  existence,  generally  ending 
in  qpnfirmed  invalidism,  or  hypochondria,  or 
actual  insanity ! — for  diseased  self-absorption 
is  the  very  root  of  madness.  It  is  a  strange 
thing  to  say — yet  I  dare  to  say  it,  for  I  be- 
lieve it  to  be  true — that  entering  a  Sisterhood, 
almost  any  sort  of  Sisterhood  where  there 
was  work  to  do,  authority  to  compel  the  do- 


148  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

ing  of  it,  and  companionsLip  to  sweeten  the 
same,  would  have  saved  many  a  woman  from 
a  lunatic  asylum. 

But  it  must  be  the  ideal  Sisterhood,  not 
that  corruption  of  it  as  seen  in  foreign  coun- 
tries which  rouses  the  British  ire  at  the  very 
name  of  "  nun."  It  must  be  exactly  opposite 
in  many  things  to  the  Roman*  Catholic  idea 
of  a  girl  giving  up  "  the  world  "  and  becom- 
ing "the  spouse  of  Christ."  Many  a  wife 
and  mother  belono^inc:  to  and  living:  in  the 
world  is  just  as  much  the  spouse  of  Christ — 
if  that  means  devoting  herself  to  good  works 
for  the  love  of  Him — as  any  vowed  nun. 

Besides,  the  Sisterhood  ought  not  to  be 
composed  at  all  of  girls,  but  of  women  old 
enough  to  choose  their  own  lot,  or  submit  to 
Fate's  choosing  it  for  them ;  who  either  can- 
not or  wnll  not  marry;  who  have  no  near 
ties,  but  need  the  support  and  sweetness  of 
adopted  affections  and  extraneous  duties.  It 
may  be  very  pleasant  to  escape  from  the  irk- 
someness  of  tending  a  crabbed  parent's  de- 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  149 

cliiiing  years,  or  enduring  the  ill-humors  of 
an  invalid  brotlier  or  sister,  in  order  to  ded- 
icate one's  self  to  general  philanthropy,  to  put 
on  a  picturesque  dress  and  devote  one's  days 
to  good  deeds  and  choral  services;  but  this 
ought  not  to  be  allowed.  Family  ties  should 
always  come  first,  and  any  Sisterhood  which 
attempts  to  break  them  merits  severe  repro- 
bation. 

In  the  heroic  life  of  Sister  Dora  one  is 
painfully  conscious  of  this,  both  in  herself 
and  in  the  fact,  if  it  be  a  fact,  that  she  was 
prohibited  from  going  to  tlie  deathbed  of  her 
own  father,  and  sent  off  to  nurse  some  other 
person,  by  order  of  her  superior.  I  was  glad 
to  hear  my  girl  say  that  immediately  after 
her  "profession"  she  was  to  go  away  for  a 
month  to  be  with  a  young  married  sister  in 
her  hour  of  trial.  And  in  answer  to  another 
question  of  mine  she  said,  "  Oh,  yes,  even 
though  you  do  not  agree  with  us,  our  Mother 
will  let  me  come  and  see  you  whenever  you 
please." 


150  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

This,  the  liberty  of  visiting  friends,  ought 
— subject  to  fit  regulations — to  be  an  es- 
sential element  in  all  Sisterhoods.  So  also 
should  be  the  right  of  returning  entirely  to 
"  the  world,"  if  they  so  choose.  Some  sort 
of  vow,  or  promise,  must  be  made — else  the 
community  would  dwindle  into  a  mere  re- 
lio-ious  boardino-'house.  But  the  vow  oucrht 
to  be,  like  that  of  marriage,  absolutely  bind- 
ing while  it  lasts,  and  intended  to  last  in 
permanence,  yet  with  the  possibility  of  dis- 
solution did  inevitable  circumstances  require 
this;  a  possibility  which  is  practically  a  cer- 
tainty, since  by  our  English  laws  no  con- 
ventual establishment  can  detain  its  inmates 
for  life,  or  against  their  own  will. 

And  besides  beincy  women  of  an  asre  to 
exercise  their  own  discretion,  they  ought  to 
be  allo\ved  full  time  to  do  so.  Two  or  three 
years,  at  least,  my  girl  had  been  resident 
with  the  Sisterhood  before  she  made  her 
"profession" — that  is,  assumed  the  white 
veil ;  and  three  or  four  years  more,  she  told 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  151 

me,  must  pass  before  she  was  allowed  to  take 
the  black  one.  "  And  then  ?"  I  said.  "  Even 
then  we  could  break  our  vows;  but,"  with  a 
quiet  smile, "  I  think  none  of  us  ever  do  so." 
Which  is  common-sense  also.  After  seven 
years'  trial  of  their  vocation,  and  being  al- 
ready past  middle  age,  most  women  would 
feel  that  their  lot  was  finally  settled,  and 
have  no  mind  to  change  it. 

Another  absolute  law  of  the  ideal  Sister- 
hood must  be  work.  In  this  nineteenth 
century  we  cannot  go  back  to  the  medisDval 
notions  of  ecstatic  mysticism  or  corporeal 
penitences.  I  am  sure  that  the  respectable 
Sisters  of  the  Orphanage  of  Mercy  neither 
flagellate  themselves,  nor  wear  hair  shirts, 
nor  sleep  on  cold  stones,  nor  rise  at  one  in 
the  morning  to  chant  litanies.  So  far  as  I 
could  see,  these  ladies  live  a  simple,  comfort- 
able, wholesome  life;  such  as  will  best  main- 
tain their  own  health,  that  they  may  use  it 
for  the  good  of  others. 

And  truly  this  ought  to  be  the  primary 


152  ON  SISTERHOODS. 

object  of  Sisterhoods.  They  should  never 
be  merely  religious  bodies — and  yet  I  doubt 
if  a  purely  secular  Sisterhood  would  long  ex- 
ist. A  hospital  nurse  once  said  to  me,  "  To 
do  our  work  well,  we  must  do  it  for  the  love 
of  God."  Tlie  same  may  be  said  of  all  work. 
But  it  must  be  done,  also,  for  the  love  of 
man ;  that  "  enthusiasm  of  humanity  "  which 
prompts  w^omen  to  devote  themselves  to 
charitable  labors,  such  as  teaching  the  young, 
or  nursing  the  old  and  sick.  Every  religious 
community  ought  to  have  distinct  and  con- 
tinuous secular  work;  and  a  community  of 
women  contains  so  many  diflScult  elements 
that  nothing  but  work  and  plenty  of  it, 
guided  by  a  head  Avhich  is  competent  to 
keep  the  machine  perpetually  going,  will 
save  it  from  collapse. 

Therefore  it  should  combine,  if  possible, 
beauty  with  duty.  I  was  glad  to  see  that 
this  particular  Sisterhood  had  made  their 
own  dress,  and  that  of  their  orphans,  as 
picturesque  as  possible;  that  their  building 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  I53 

within  and  without  was  not  only  convenient 
but  elegant,  and  their  chapel  and  its  service 
as  beautiful  as  God's  house  should  be.  And 
why  not?  Lives  devoted  to  duty  cannot 
afford  to  have  any  beauty  taken  out  of  them. 
And  no  one  can  look  round  on  this  lovely 
outside  world  without  feelino^  that  its  Creator 
meant  us  to  love  beauty,  to  crave  after  it, 
and  to  attain  it  whenever  possible. 

The  Low-Church  Bible-woman  who  goes 
about  in  her  rusty  black,  with  a  bundle  of 
tracts  in  one  hand  and  a  basket  in  the  other, 
is  a  most  useful  and  honorable  person;  but 
the  lady  in  a  nun's  dress,  or  with  the  white 
cross  of  the  hospital  nurse,  carries  with  her 
a  certain  atmosphere  of  grace  which  cannot 
be  without  its  influence  even  upon  the  rough- 
est natures.  In  our  ardent  jDursuit  of  the 
Good,  we  are  apt  to  forget,  especially  as  we 
grow  older,  that  its  power  is  doubled  when 
it  is  allied  to  the  Beautiful. 

Of  course,  if  every  woman  were  strong 
enough  to  live  and  work  alone,  to  carry  out 


154  ^^  SISTERHOODS. 

her  own  individual  life  and  make  tlie  best 
of  it,  without  leaning  on  any  one  else,  there 
would  be  no  need  for  Sisterhoods.  But  it 
is  not  so.  Very  few  women  can  take  care 
of  themselves,  to  say  nothing  of  other  peo- 
ple. Some  say  this  is.  the  fault  of  nature, 
some  of  education  —  a  centuries-Ion 2:  educa- 
tlon  into  helpless  subservience.  Whichever 
theory  is  right,  or,  perhaps,  half  right  and 
half  w^rong,  the  result  is  the  same. 

For  such  women  the  life  in  community  is 
eminently  desirable.  It  provides  shelter,  un- 
der the  guardianship  of  a  capable  head ;  com- 
panionship, for  only  the  strong  and  selfde- 
l)endent  can  endure,  permanently,  their  own 
company — and,  perhaps,  even  for  them  this 
is  not  always  good  ;  sympathy,  something  on 
which  to  expend  their  barren  and  shut-up 
affections ;  and,  lastly,  it  supplies  work,  that 
definite  and  regular  Avork  which  is  the  best 
solace  of  sorrow,  the  best  safeguard  against 
temptation,  the  only  efficient  help  to  that 
ideal  condition  of  a  "sound  mind  in  a  sound 


ON  SISTERHOODS.  155 

body  "  \Yhicli  all  women,  however  feeble  tlieir 
minds  and  ugly  their  bodies,  should  strive 
for  to  the  very  end  of  life. 

These  advantages — not  small,  even  though 
weighed  against  many  disadvantages — were 
no  doubt  the  reason  why,  for  so  many  cen- 
turies, conventual  establishments  existed,  and 
still  do  exist,  in  Catholic  countries.  When 
our  Protestant  horror  of  them  has  a  little 
subsided,  we  may  learn — indeed,  in  many  in- 
stances we  are  already  learning — to  eliminate 
the  good  from  the  evil,  and  make  use  of,  with- 
out abusing  it,  Hamlet's  not  altogether  un- 
wise advice  to  Ophelia,  "  Go,  get  thee  to  a 
nunnery — go — go — go  !" 

And  some  of  us,  who  set  sail  so  gayly  for 
the  natural  port  but  never  found  it,  and  now 
drift  hither  and  thither,  helmless  and  hope- 
less, upon  the  world's  desolate  sea — some  of 
us  would,  perhaps,  be  not  sorry  to  go,  and 
none  the  worse  for  going,  into  some  quiet 
shelter,  where  we  might  take  up  our  daily 
burden,  and  grow  stronger  in  the  carrying  of 


156  C>N  SISTERHOODS. 

it,  knowing  we  did  not  carry  it  alone.  It 
is  the  old  fable  of  the  bundle  of  sticks ;  in 
which  the  feeble  stick,  the  crooked  stick,  the 
broken  stick  can  bind  itself  up  with  the 
stronger  ones,  and  by  association  with  oth- 
ers be  able  to  cure  its  own  deficiencies  and 
do  good  service  to  the  end  of  its  days. 

For  w^hich  purpose  I  sa}^  these  few  ^vords 
about  Sisterhoods. 


FACING  THE  WORLD. 

A  STORY  FOR  BOYS. 

"Mother,  I  think  I'm  almost  glad  the 
holidays  are  done.  It's  quite  different, 
going  back  to  school  again  Avhen  one  goes 
to  be  captain,  as  I'm  sure  to  be.  Isn't  it 
jolly?" 

Mrs.  Boyd's  face,  as  she  smiled  back  at 
Donald,  was  not  exactly  "jolly."  Still  she 
did  smile,  and  then  there  came  out  the  strong 
likeness  often  seen  between  mother  and  son, 
even  when,  as  in  this  case,  the  features  are 
very  dissimilar.  Mrs.  Boyd  was  a  pretty, 
delicate  little  Englishwoman;  and  Donald 
took  after  his  father,  a  big,  brawny  Scotsman, 
certainly  not  "pretty,"  and  not  always  sweet. 
Poor  man !  he  had  of  late  years  had  only 
too  much  to  make  him  sour. 

Though  she  tried  to  smile,  and  succeeded, 


158  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

tlie  tears  were  in  Mrs.  Boyd's  eyes,  and  her 
mouth  was  quivering.  But  she  set  it  tightly 
together,  and  then  she  looked  more  than  ever 
like  her  son — or,  rather,  her  son  looked  like 
her. 

He  was  too  eac^er  in  his  delio;ht  to  notice 
her  much.  "It  is  so  jolly,  isn't  it,  mother? 
I  never  thought  I'd  get  to  the  top  of  the 
school  at  all,  for  I'm  not  near  so  clever  as 
some  of  the  fellows.  But  now  I've  got  my 
place,  I  like  it,  and  I  mean  to  keep  it.  You'll 
be  pleased  at  that,  mother  ?" 

"I  should  have  been — if — if — "  Mrs. 
Boyd  tried  to  get  the  words  out,  and  failed, 
closed  her  eyes  as  tight  as  her  mouth  for  a 
minute — then  opened  them,  and  looked  her 
boy  in  the  face  gravely  and  sadly. 

"It  goes  to  my  heart  to  tell  you — I've 
been  'waiting  to  say  it  all  morning — but, 
Donald,  my  dear,  you  will  never  go  back  to 
school  at  all." 

"Not  go  back !  when  I'm  captain,  and  you 
and  fatlier  both  said  tliat  if  I  got  to  be  that 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  159 

I  should  stop  till  I  was  seventeen,  and  now 
I'm  only  fifteen  and  a  half!  Oh,  mother, 
you  don't  mean  it !  Father  would  not  break 
his  word.     I  may  go  back  ?" 

Mrs.  Boyd  shook  her  head  sadly,  and  then 
explained,  as  briefly  and  calmly  as  she  could, 
the  heavy  blow  which  had  fallen  upon  the 
father,  and,  indeed,  upon  the  whole  family. 
Mr.  Boyd  had  long  been  in  weak  health — 
about  as  serious  a  trouble  as  could  have  be- 
fallen a  man  in  his  profession — an  account- 
ant, as  they  call  it  in  Scotland.  Lately  he 
had  made  some  serious  blundei's  in  his  ^^- 
ures,  and  his  memory  had  become  so  uncer- 
tain that  his  wife  persuaded  him  to  consuljb 
a  first-rate  Edinburgh  physician,  whose  opin- 
ion, given  only  yesterday,  after  many  days  of 
anxious  suspense,  was  that  he  must  give  up 
work  altogether,  or  sink  into  that  most  hope- 
less of  illnesses — creeping  paralysis — which, 
indeed,  had  already  begun. 

"  Poor  father,  poor  father !"     Donald  put 
his  hand  before  his  eyes.     He  was  too  big  a 


150  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

boy  to  cry,  or,  at  any  rate,  to  be  seen  crying, 
but  it  was  with  a  choking  voice  that  he 
spoke  next.  "I'll  take  care  of  you  all;  I'm 
old  enough." 

"Yes,  in  many  ways  you  are,  my  son," 
said  Mrs.  Boyd,  who  had  had  a  day  and  a 
night  to  face  her  sorrow,  and  knew  she  must 
do  so  calmly.  "  But  you  are  not  old  enough 
to  manage  the  business.  Your  father  will 
require  to  take  a  partner  immediately,  which 
will  reduce  our  income  one  half.  Therefore 
we  cannot  possibly  afford  to  send  you  to 
school  again.  The  little  ones  must  go;  they 
are  not  nearly  educated  yet,  but  you  are. 
You  will  have  to  face  the  world,  and  earn 
your  own  living  as  soon  as  ever  you  can,  my 
poor  boy !" 

"Don't  call  me  poor,  mother.  I've  got 
you  and  father,  and  the  rest.  And,  as  you 
say,  I've  had  a  good  education,  so  far.  And 
I'm  fifteen  and  a  half — no,  fifteen  and  three 
quarters — almost  a  man.     I'm  not  afraid." 

"Nor  I,"  said  his  mother, who  had  waited 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  1^1 

a  full  minute  before  Donald  could  find  voice 
to  say  all  this,  and  it  was  stammered  out 
awkwardly  and  at  random.  "  No,  I'm  not 
afraid  because  my  boy  has  to  earn  his  bread. 
I  had  earned  mine  for  years,  as  a  governess, 
when  father  mari'ied  me.  I  began  work  be- 
fore I  was  sixteen.  My  son  will  have  to  do 
the  same — that  is  all." 

That  day  the  mother  and  son  spoke  no 
more  together.  It  was  as  much  as  they 
could  do  to  bear  their  trouble,  without  talk- 
ing about  it,  and  besides  Donald  was  not  a 
boy  to  "  make  a  fuss "  over  things.  He 
could  meet  sorrow  when  it  came;  that  is, 
the  little  of  it  he  had  ever  known,  but  he 
disliked  speaking  of  it,  and  perhaps  he  was 
riojht. 

So  he  just  "  made  himself  scarce  "  till  bed- 
time, and  never  said  a  word  to  anybody,  un- 
til his  mother  came  into  the  boys'  room  to 
bid  them  good-night.  There  were  three  of 
them,  but  all  were  asleep  except  Donald. 
As  his  mother  bent  down  to  kiss  him,  he 


1(32  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

put  both  arms  round  her  neck,  which  he  did 
not  often  do. 

"  Mother,  I'm  going  to  begin  to-morrow." 

"  Begin  what,  my  son  V 

"Facing  the  world,  as  you  said  I  must. 
I  can't  go  to  school  again,  so  I  mean  to  try 
and  earn  my  own  living." 

"How?" 

"  I  don't  quite  know,  but  I'll  try.  There 
are  several  things  I  could  be  —  a  clerk,  or 
even  a  message-boy.  I  shouldn't  like  it,  but 
I'd  do  anything  rather  than  do  nothing." 

Mrs.  Boyd  sat  down  on  the  side  of  the 
bed.  If  she  felt  inclined  to  cry,  she  had  too 
much  sense  to  show  it;  she  only  took  firm 
hold  of  her  boy's  hand,  and  waited  for  him 
to  speak  on. 

"  I've  been  thinking,  mother,  I  was  to  have 
a  new^  suit  at  Christmas;  will  you  give  it 
now  ?  And  let  it  be  a  coat,  not  a  jacket ; 
I'm  tall  enough — five  feet  seven  last  month, 
and  growing  still.  I  should  look  almost  a 
man.     Then  I  would  go  round  to  every  of- 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  1^3 

fice  in  Edinburgh  and  ask  if  tbey  wanted  a 
clerk  or  anything — I  wouldn't  mind  taking 
amjtiiing — to  begin  with.  And  I  can  write 
a  decent  hand,  and  I'm  not  bad  at  figures. 
As  for  my  Latin  and  Greek — " 

Here  Donald  gulped  down  a  sigh,  for  he 
was  a  capital  classic,  and  it  had  been  sug- 
gested that  he  should  go  to  Glasgow  Uni- 
versity and  try  for  "the  Snell,"  which  has 
taken  so  many  clever  young  Scotsmen  to 
Balliol  College,  Oxford,  and  thence  on  to 
fame  and  prosperity.  But,  alas !  no  college 
career  was  now  possible  for  Donald  Boyd. 
The  best  he  could  hope  for  was  to  earn  a 
few  shillings  a  week  as  a  common  clerk.  He 
knew  this,  and  so  did  his  motheiv  But  they 
never  complained.  It  was  no  fault  of  theirs, 
or  of  anybody's.  It  was  just,  as  they  de- 
voutly called  it,  "  the  will  of  God." 

"  Your  Latin  and  Greek  may  come  in  some 
day,  my  boy,"  said  Mrs.  Boyd,  cheerfully. 
"  Good  work  is  never  lost.  In  the  meantime 
your  plan  is  a  very  good  one,  and  you  shall 


164  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

liave  your  new  clothes  at  once.  Then  do  as 
you  think  best." 

"All  right;  good-night,  mother,"  said  Don- 
ald, and  in  ^ve  minutes  more  was  fast  asleep. 

But  though  he  was  much  given  to  sleep- 
ing of  nights — indeed,  he  never  remembered 
lying  awake  for  a  single  hour  in  his  life — 
during  daytime  there  never  was  a  more 
"  wide-awake  "  boy  than  Donald  Boyd.  He 
kept  his  eyes  open  to  everything,  and  never 
let  the  "golden  minute"  slip  by  him.  He 
never  idled  about;  play  he  didn't  consider 
idling  (nor  do  I!).  And  I  am  bound  to 
confess  that  every  day  until  the  new  clothes 
came  home  was  scrupulously  spent  in  crick- 
et, football,  and  all  the  other  amusements 
which  he  was  as  good  at  as  he  was  at  his 
lessons.  He  wanted  to  "make  the  best  of 
his  holidays,"  he  said,  knowing  Avell  that  for 
him  holiday-time,  as  well  as  school-time,  was 
now  done,  and  the  work  of  the  world  had 
begun  in  earnest. 

The  clothes  came  home  on  Saturday  night. 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  105 

and  lie  went  to  eliurcli  in  them  on  Sunday, 
to  his  little  sisters'  great  admiration.  Still 
greater  was  their  w^onder  when,  on  Monday 
morning,  he  appeared  in  the  same  suit,  look- 
ing "quite  a  man,"  as  they  unanimously 
agreed,  and,  almost  before  breakfast  was 
done,  started  off,  not  saying  a  word  of  where 
he  was  going. 

He  did  not  come  back  till  the  younger 
ones  were  all  away  to  bed,  so  there  was  no 
one  to  question  him,  which  was  fortunate, 
for  they  might  not  have  got  very  smooth 
answers.  His  mother  saw  this,  and  she  like- 
wise forbore.  She  w^as  not  surprised  that 
the  bright,  brave  face  of  the  morning  looked 
dull  and  tired,  and  that  evidently  Donald 
had  nothinor  to  tell  her. 

"  I  think  ril  go  to  bed,"  was  all  he  said. 
"  Mother,  will  you  give  me  a  *  piece '  in  my 
pocket  to-morrow?  One  can  walk  better 
when  one  isn't  so  desperately  hungry." 

"  Yes,  my  boy."  She  kissed  him,  saw  that 
he  was  warmed  and  fed  —  he  had  evidently 


IQQ  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

been  on  his  legs  the  whole  day;  then  sent 
him  off  to  his  bed,  where  she  soon  heard 
him  delightfully  snoring,  oblivious  of  all  his 
cares. 

The  same  thing  went  on,  day  after  day, 
for  seven  days.  Sometimes  he  told  his 
mother  what  had  happened  to  him  and 
where  he  had  been,  sometimes  not.  What 
was  the  good  of  telling  ?  it  was  always  the 
same  story.  Nobody  wanted  a  bo}^,  or  a 
man,  for  Donald,  trusting  to  his  inches  and 
his  coat,  had  applied  for  man's  work  also, 
but  in  vain. 

Mrs.  Boyd  was  not  astonished.  She  knew 
how  hard  it  is  to  get  one's  foot  into  ever  so 
small  a  corner  in  this  busy  world,  where  ten 
are  always  struggling  for  the  place  of  one. 
Still,  she  also  knew  that  it  never  does  to 
give  in,  that  one  must  leave  no  stone  un- 
turned if  one  wished  to  get  work  at  all. 
Also,  she  still  believed  in  an  axiom  of  her 
youth,  "nothing  is  denied  to  well-directed 
labor."     But  it  must  be  real,  hard   labor, 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  1(37 

and  it  must  also  be  *^  well-directed."  So, 
though  her  heart  ached  sorely,  as  only  a 
mother's  can,  she  never  betrayed  it,  but  each 
morning  sent  her  boy  away  with  a  cheerful 
face,  and  each  evening  received  him  with 
one,  which,  if  less  cheerful,  was  not  less  sym- 
pathetic.    But  she  never  said  a  word. 

At  the  week's  end  —  in  fact,  on  Sunday 
morning  as  they  were  walking  to  church — 
Donald  said  to  her,  "  Mother,  my  new  clothes 
haven't  been  of  the  slightest  good.  I've 
been  all  over  Edinburgh,  to  every  place  I 
could  think  of — writers'  offices,  merchants' 
offices,  wharves,  railway-stations,  but  it's  no 
good.  Everybody  wants  to  know  where 
I've  been  before,  and  I've  been  nowhere,  ex- 
cept to  school.  I  said  I  was  willing  to  learn, 
but  nobody  w^ill  teach  me;  they  say  they 
can't  aftbrd  it — it  is  like  keeping  a  dog  and 
barking  yourself — which  is  only  too  true," 
added  Donald,  with  a  heavy  sigh. 

"  Maybe,"  said  Mrs.  Boyd ;  yet  as  she 
looked  up  at  her  son — she  really  did  look  up 


108  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

at  him,  be  was  so  tall — she  felt  that  if  his 
honest,  intelligent  face  and  manly  bearing 
did  not  win  somethino-  at  last,  what  was  the 
world  coming  to?  "My  boy"  she  said, 
"  things  are  very  hard  for  you,  but  not  harder 
than  for  others.  I  remember  once,  when  I 
was  only  a  few  years  older  than  you,  finding 
myself  with  only  half  a  crown  in  my  pocket. 
To  be  sure,  it  was  a  whole  half  crown,  for  I 
had  paid  every  halfpenny  I  owed  that  morn- 
ing, but  I  had  no  idea  when  the  next  half 
crown  would  come.  However,  it  did  come. 
I  earned  two  pounds  ten  the  very  next  day." 
"Did  you  really,  motherr  said  Donald, 
his  eyes  brightening.  "  Then  I'll  go  on,  and 
ril  not  ^gang  awa'  back  to  my  mither,'  as 
that  old  gentleman  advised  me,  a  queer, 
crabbed  old  fellow  he  was  too,  but  he  was 
the  only  otie  who  asked  my  name  and  ad- 
dress. The  rest  of  them — well,  mother,  I've 
stood  a  good  deal  these  seven  days,"  Donald 
added,  gulping  down  something  between  a 
"fuif "  of  wrath  and  a  sob. 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  169 

"I  am  sure  you  have,  my  boy." 
"  But  ril  hold  on ;  only  you'll  have  to  get 
my  boots  mended,  and,  meantime,  I  should 
like  to  try  a  new  dodge.  My  bicycle — it 
lies  in  the  washing-house — you  remember  I 
broke  it,  and  you  didn't  wish  it  mended,  lest 
I  should  break  something  worse  than  a 
wheel.  Perhaps!  It  wasn't  worth  while 
risking  my  life  for  mere  pleasure,  but  I  want 
my  bicycle  now  for  use.  If  you'll  let  me 
have  it  mended,  I  can  go  up  and  down  the 
country  for  fifty  miles  in  search  of  work,  to 
Falkirk,  Linlithgow,  or  even  Glasgow — and 
I'll  cost  you  nothing  for  travelling  expenses. 
Isn't  that  a  bright  idea,  mother  ?" 

She  had  not  the  heart  to  say  no,  or  to 
-  suggest  that  a  boy  on  a  bicycle  applying  for 
work  was  a  thing  too  novel  to  be  eminently 
successful.  But  to  get  work  was  at  once  so 
essential  and  so  hopeless  that  she  would  not 
throw  any  cold  water  on  Donald's  eagerness 
and  pluck.  She  hoped,  too,  that  spite  of 
the  eccentricity  of  the  notion,  some  shrewd, 
8 


170  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

kind-hearted  gentleman  might  have  sense 
enough  to  see  the  honest  purpose  of  the  poor 
lad,  who  had  only  himself  to  depend  upon. 
For  his  father  had  now  fallen  into  a  state  of 
depression  which  made  all  application  to 
him  for  either  advice  or  help  worse  than 
useless.  And  as  both  himself  and  Mrs.  Boyd 
had  been  orphans,  without  brother  or  sister, 
there  were  no  relatives  to  come  to  the  res- 
cue. Donald  knew,  and  his  mother  knew 
too,  that  he  must  shift  for  himself,  to  sink  or 
swim. 

So  after  two  days'  rest,  which  he  much 
needed,  the  boy  went  off  again  "  on  his  own 
hook,"  and  his  bicycle,  which  was  a  degree 
better  than  his  legs,  he  said,  as  it  saved  shoe- 
leather.  Also  he  was  able  to  come  home 
pretty  regularly  at  the  same  hour,  which  was 
a  great  relief  to  his  mother.  But  he  came 
home  nearly  as  tired  as  evei",  and  with  a  de- 
spondent look  which  deepened  every  day. 
Evidently  it  was  just  the  same  story — no 
work  to  be  had,  or  if  there  was  work,  it  \Yas 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  171 

struggled  for  by  a  score  of  fellows,  with  age, 
character,  experience,  to  back  them;  and 
Donald  had  none  of  the  three.  But  he  had 
one  quality,  the  root  of  all  success,  and  al- 
most certain  of  success  in  the  end — dogged 
perseverance. 

There  is  a  saying  that  we  British  gain  our 
victories,  not  because  we  are  never  beaten, 
but  because  we  never  will  see  that  w^e  are 
beaten,  and  so  go  on  fighting  till  we  win. 
"  Never  say  die,"  w^as  Donald's  word  to  his 
mother,  night  after  night.  But  she  knew 
that  those  who  never  say  die,  sometimes  do 
die,  quite  quietly ;  and  she  watched  with  an 
anxious  heart  her  boy  growing  thinner  and 
more  worn,  even  though  brown  as  a  berry, 
with  constant  exposure  all  day  long  to  wind 
and  weather,  which  was  now  becoming  less 
autumn  than  winter. 

After  a  fortnight  Mrs.  Boyd  made  up  her 
mind  that  this  could  not  go  on  any  longer, 
and  said  so. 

"Very  well,"  Donald  answered,  accepting 


172  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

her  decision,  as  he  had  been  in  the  habit  of 
doing  all  his  life.  Mrs.  Boyd's  children  knew 
well  that  whatever  her  will  was,  it  was  sure 
to  be  a  just  will,  and  for  them,  not  herself, 
who  was  the  last  person  she  ever  thought 
of.  "Yes,  I'll  give  in,  if  you  think  I  ought, 
for  it's  only  wearing  out  myself  and  my 
clothes  to  no  good.  Only  let  me  have  one 
day  more,  and  I'll  go  as  far  as  ever  I  can, 
perhaps  to  Dunfermline,  or  even  Glasgow." 

She  would  not  forbid,  and  once  more  she 
started  him  off,  with  a  cheerful  face,  in  the 
twilight  of  the  wet  October  morning,  and 
sat  all  day  long  in  the  empty  house — for 
the  younger  ones  were  now  all  going  to 
school  again — thinking  sorrowfully  of  her 
eldest,  whose  meny  schooldays  were  done 
forever. 

In  the  dusk  of  the  afternoon  a  card  was 
brought  up  to  her,  with  the  message  that  an 
old  gentleman  was  waiting  below,  wishing 
to  see  her. 

A  shudder  ran  through  the  poor  mother, 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  173 

wLo,  like  many  another  mother,  hated  bi- 
cycles, and  never  had  an  easy  mind  when 
Donald  was  away  on  his.  The  stranger's 
first  word  was  anything  but  reassuring. 

"  Beg  pardon,  ma'am,  but  is  your  name 
Boyd,  and  have  you  a  son  called  Donald, 
who  went  out  on  a  bicycle  this  morning?" 

"  Yes,  yes — has  anything  happened  ?  Tell 
me  quick." 

"I'm  not  aware,  ma'am,  that  anything  has 
happened,"  said  the  old  gentleman ;  "  I  saw 
the  lad  at  eio-ht  this  morninsr.  He  seemed 
to  be  managing  his  machine  uncommonly 
well.  I  met  him  at  the  foot  of  a  brae  near 
the  Dean  Bridge;  he  had  got  off  and  was 
w^alking,  so  he  saw  me  and  took  off  his  cap. 
I  like  politeness  in  a  young  fellow  towards 
an  old  one." 

"  Did  he  know  you  ?  for  I  have  not  that 
pleasure,"  said  Mrs.  Boyd,  polite  though 
puzzled;  for  the  man  did  not  look  quite  a 
gentleman,  and  spoke  with  the  strong  accent 
of  an  uneducated  person  ;  yet  he  had  a  kind- 


17  J:  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

ly  exjDression,  and  seemed  honest  and  well- 
meaning,  tboiigh  decidedly  "  canny." 

'^  I  canna  say  lie  knew  me,  but  he  remem- 
bered me,  which  was  civil  of  him.  And  then 
I  minded  the  lad  as  one  that  had  come  to 
ask  me  for  work  a  week  or  two  ago,  and  I 
took  his  name  and  address.  That's  your 
son's  writing  ?" — he  fumbled  out  and  showed 
a  scrap  of  paper.     "It's  hona  jide^  isn't  it?" 

"  Certainly." 

"  And  he  really  is  in  search  of  work  ?  He 
hasn't  run  away  from  home,  or  been  turned 
out  by  his  father  for  misconduct,  or  anything 
of  that  sort?  He  isn't  a  scamp  or  a  ne'er-do- 
weel  ?" 

"I  hope  he  does  not  look  like  it!"  said 
Mrs.  Boyd,  proudly. 

"  No,  ma'am,  you're  right,  he  doesn't.  He 
carries  his  character  in  his  face,  which,  may- 
be, is  better  than  in  his  pocket.  It  was  that 
which  made  me  ask  his  name  and  address, 
though  I  could  do  nothing  for  him." 

"  You  were  the  gentleman  who  told  him 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  175 

you  couldn't  keep  a  clog  and  bark  yourself," 
said  Mrs.  Boyd,  amused  and  just  a  shade 
hopeful. 

"Precisely,  nor  can  I.  It  would  have 
been  cool  impudence  in  a  lad  to  come  and 
ask  to  be  tau2:ht  his  work  first  and  then 
paid  for  it,  if  he  hadn't  been  so  very  much 
in  earnest  that  I  was  rather  sorry  for  him. 
I'm  inclined  to  believe,  from  the  talk  I  had 
with  him  at  the  foot  of  the  brae  to-day,  that 
he  would  bark  with  uncommon  little  teach- 
ing. Material,  ma'am,  is  what  we  want.  I 
don't  care  for  it's  being  raw,  if  it's  only  the 
right  material.  I've  made  tip  my  mind  to 
try  your  boy." 

"Thank  God!". 

"  What  did  you  say,  ma'am  ?  But — I  beg 
your  pardon."  For  he  saw  Mrs.  Boyd  had 
quite  broken  down.  In  truth,  the  strain  had 
been  so  long  and  so  great  that  this  sudden 
relief  was  quite  too  much  for  her. 

"  I  ought  to  beg  your  pardon,"  she  said, 
at  last,  "for  being  so  foolish;  but  we  have 


176  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

had  hard  times  of  late."  And  then  in  a 
few  simple  words  she  told  Donald's  whole 
story. 

The  old  man  listened  to  it  in  silence. 
Sometimes  he  nodded  his  head,  or  bent  his 
chin  on  his  stout  stick  as  he  sat,  but  he 
made  no  comments  whatever  except  a  brief 
"  Thank  you,  ma'am.  Now  to  business,"  con- 
tinued he,  taking  out  his  watch,  "  for  I'm  due 
at  dinner,  and  I  always  keep  my  appoint- 
ments, even  with  myself.  I  hope  your  lad's 
a  punctual  lad  ?" 

"Yes,  he  promised  to  be  back  by  dark, 
and  I  am  sure  he  will  be." 

"  I  can't  wait,  though.  I  never  wait  for 
anybody,  but  I  keep  nobody  waiting  for  me. 
I'm  Bethune  &  Co.,  Leith,  merchants  — 
practically,  old  John  Bethune,  who  began 
life  as  a  message-boy,  and  has  done  pretty 
well,  considering." 

He  had,  as  Mrs.  Boyd  was  well  aware. 
Bethune  &  Co.  was  a  name  so  well  known 
that  she  could  hardly  believe  in  her  boy's 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  177 

good-luck  in  getting  into  the  house  in  any 
capacity  whatever. 

"  So  that's  settled,"  said  Mr.  Bethune,  ris- 
ing. "Let  him  come  to  me  on  Monday 
morning,  and  I'll  see  what  he  is  fit  for. 
He'll  have  to  begin  at  the  very  bottom, 
sweep  the  ofBce,  perhaps — I  did  it  myself 
once.  And  I'll  give  him — let  me  see — ten 
shillino-s  a  week  to  hemn  with." 

"To  begin  with,"  repeated  Mrs.  Boyd, 
gently  but  firmly.  "But  he  will  soon  be 
worth  more.     I  know  my  boy." 

"Very  well.  When  I  see  what  stuff 
lie  is  made  of,  he  shall  have  a  rise.  But 
I  never  do  things  at  haphazard,  and  it's 
easier  going  up  than  coming  down.  I'm 
not  a  benevoleift  man,  Mrs.  Boyd,  and  you 
needn't  think  it.  But  I've  fouo-ht  the 
world  pretty  hard  myself,  and  I  like  to  see 
those  that  are  fio-htinsr  it.  Good-eveuinsr. 
Isn't  that  your  son  coming  round  the  cor. 
ner?  Well,  he's  back  exact  to  his  time, 
at  any  rate.  Tell  him  I  hope  lie'll  be  as 
8* 


178  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

punctual  on  Monday  morning.     Good-even- 
ing, ma'am." 

Now,  if  this  were  an  imaginary  story,  I 
migbt  wind  it  up  by  a  delightful  denouement 
of  Mr.  Bethune's  turning  out  an  old  friend 
of  the  family,  or  developing  into  a  new  one, 
and  taking  such  a  fancy  to  Donald  that  he 
i.nmediately  gave  him  a  clerkship  with  a 
large  salary,  and  the  promise  of  a  partner- 
ship on  coming  of  age;  or  this  worthy  gen- 
tleman should  be  an  eccentric  old  bachelor 
who  immediately  adopted  that  wonderful 
boy,  and  befriended  the  whole  Boyd  family. 

But  neither  of  these  things,  nor  anything 
else  remarkable,  happened  in  the  real  story: 
which,  as  it  is  literally  tiiie,  though  told 
Avith  certain  necessary  disguises,  I  prefer  to 
keep  to  as  closely  as  I  can.  Such  wonder- 
ful bits  of  "luck"  do  not  happen  in  real 
life;  or  happen  so  rarely  that  one  inclines  at 
hist  to  believe  very  little  in  either  good  or 
ill  fortune,  as  a  matter  of  chance.     There  is 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  J 79 

always  something  at  the  back  of  it  wliicli 
furnishes  a  key  to  the  whole.  Practically,  a 
man's  lot  is  of  his  own  making.  He  may 
fail,  for  a  while,  imcleservedly;  or  he  may 
succeed,  equally  undeservedly;  but,  in  the 
lono;  run,  Time  brino-s  both  its  revenc^es  and 
its  rewards. 

As  it  did  to  Donald  Boyd.  He  has  not 
been  taken  into  Bethune  &  Co.  as  a  partner; 
and  it  was  lono;  before  he  became  even  a 
clerk,  at  least  with  anything  like  a  high 
salary.  For  Mr.  Bethune,  so  far  from  being 
an  old  bachelor,  has  a  large  family  to  pro- 
vide for,  and  is  bringing  up  several  of  his 
sons  to  his  own  business,  so  there  is  little 
room  for  a  stranger.  But  a  young  man  who 
deserves  to  find  room  generally  does  find  it 
— or  make  it;  and  though  Donald  started 
at  the  lowest  rung  of  the  ladder,  he  may 
climb  to  the  top  yet. 

He  had  "a  foir  field  and  no  favor;"  in- 
deed he  neither  wished  nor  asked  for  favor. 
He  determined   to  stand    on   his  own  feet 


180  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

from  the  first.  He  had  hard  work  and  few 
holidays;  made  mistakes,  found  them  out 
and  corrected  them ;  got  sharp  words  and 
bore  them ;  learned  his  own  weak  points, 
and,  not  so  easily,  his  strong  ones.  Still  he 
did  learn  them;  for  unless  you  can  trust 
yourself,  be  sure  nobody  else  will  trust  you. 

This  was  Donald's  great  point.  He  was 
trusted.  People  soon  found  out  that  they 
might  trust  him;  that  he  always  told  the 
truth,  and  never  pretended  to  do  more  than 
he  could  do;  but  that  what  he  could  do, 
they  might  depend  upon  his  doing  jiunc- 
tually,  accurately,  carefully,  and  never  leav- 
incr  off  till  it  was  done.  Therefore,  though 
others  might  be  quicker,  sharper,  more  "  up 
to  things  "  than  he,  there  was  no  one  so  re- 
liable ;  and  it  soon  got  to  be  a  proverb  in 
the  office  of  Bethune  &  Co. — and  other 
offices  too — ^'  If  you  wish  a  thing  done,  go 
to  Boyd." 

I  am  bound  to  say  this,  for  I  am  paint- 
ing no  imaginary  portrait,  but  describing  an 


A  STORY  FOR  BOYS.  Igl 

individual  who  really  exists,  and  who  may 
be  met  any  day  walking  about  Edinburgh, 
though  his  name  is  not  Donald  Boyd,  and 
there  is  no  such  firm  as  Bethune  &  Co.  But 
the  house  he  does  belong  to  value  the  young 
fellow  so  highly  that  there  is  little  doubt  he 
will  rise  in  it — rise  in  every  ^vay,  probably 
to  the  very  top  of  the  tree — and  tell  his 
children  and  grandchildren  the  story,  which 
in  the  main  features  I  have  recorded  here,  of 
how  he  first  began  Facing  the  World. 

POSTSCRIPTUM. 

This  story,  written  some  years  ago,  was, 
for  various  reasons, left  unpublished.  Alas! 
there  is  no  need  to  keep  silence  now,  for  the 
boy  has  passed  into  "  the  land  where  all 
things  are  foi-gotten."  But  none  who  knew 
him  will  ever  forget  the  brave,  brief  young 
life,  and  all  the  promise  that  it  gave. 

"  Donald  Boyd" — I  will  not  give  his  real 
name — died  a  few  months  ago,  still  only  a 
boy,  but  leaving  behind  him  the  honorable 


182  FACING  THE  WORLD. 

memory  of  a  reliable  and  lovable  man.  He 
was  followed  to  the  grave  by  the  heads  of 
his  firm,  and  all  his  fellow-clerks,  as  well  as 
by  a  crowd  of  devoted  friends.  Out  of  that 
too  early  grave — into  the  mystery  of  which 
we  dare  not  look,  for  God  knows  best — let 
the  dear  dead  boy  speak  to  other  boys,  bid- 
ding them  grow  up  like  him,  and  fill  the 
place  in  the  world  that  he  would  have  filled 
— but  the  Father  called  him  home. 


A  PARIS  ATELIER. 

Some  generations  since  it  was  considered 
unnecessary,  not  to  say  impossible,  for  women 
to  work ;  in  the  last  generation  it  was  often 
necessary,  but  never  quite  *^  respectable ;"  in 
our  generation  it  Las  become,  not  only  nec- 
essary, but  essential;  nay,  even  desirable. 
Whatever  be  the  cause,  undoubtedly  in  this 
nineteenth  century  a  large  proportion  of  our 
women,  old  and  young,  have  either  no  mas- 
culine protectors  at  all,  or  such  as  are  prac- 
tically useless,  if  not  worse  than  useless. 
And  though  nothing  will  ever  abrogate  the 
natural  law,  that  women's  work  should  be 
within  the  home,  if  possible ;  still,  when  im- 
possible, tlie  work  must  be  accepted  and 
done  outside.  Working  women  in  all  ranks, 
from  our  queen  downwards,  are,  and  ought  to 
be,  objects  of  respect  to  the  entire  community. 


184  ^  PARIS  ATELIER. 

Feeling  this  strongly,  I  started,  one  bright 
Marcli  morning,  to  investigate  an  atelier  for 
female  students  on  the  south  side  of  Paiis. 
It  was  somewhat  difficult  to  find,  Init  at 
last  I  was  directed,  to  a  courtyard,  where, 
emerging  from  among  some  stunted,  mel- 
ancholy-looking shrubs,  a  woman  pointed 
to  a  wooden  stair,  leading,  she  said,  to  "  Vat& 

I  mounted,  and  boldly  knocked  at  the 
door.  It  opened,  disclosing  a  large  room, 
full  of  artists — all  feminine — not  working, 
but  scattered  in  groups,  and  chattering  in 
several  tongues,  English  preponderating,  as 
only  women,  and  young  women,  can  chat- 
ter. They  did  not  look  particularly  tidy, 
having  on  their  working-clothes — an  apron 
and  sleeves  grimed  with  chalk,  charcoal, 
and  paint — but  all  looked  intelligent,  busy, 
and  happy.  The  room  was  as  full  of  easels 
as  it  would  hold ;  and  in  the  centre  was  a 
rostrum,  wliere  the  model,  a  picturesque 
old  woman,  sat  placidly  eating  her  morning 


A  PARIS  ATELIER  I35 

bread  and — I  Lope  not  garlic,  but  it  looked 
only  too  like  it. 

The  working  woman  may  have  a  few  un- 
desirable characteristics,  such  as  indifference 
to  fashion,  a  tendency  to  rough  hair  and  not 
over-clean  cuffs  and  collars,  but,  take  her  for 
all  in  all,  she  is  a  much  more  interesting 
person  than  your  idle  butterfly,  the  fashion- 
able young  lady.  These  girls,  for  none 
seemed  much  past  girlhood — were  of  all  na- 
tionalities— English,  American,  French,  Ger- 
man; and  of  all  conditions  in  life.  Some 
were  pretty,  some  plain,  some  just  ordinary; 
but  I  did  not  see  one  stupid  face,  or  one  bad 
face,  among  them  all,  and  all  appeared  cheer- 
ful, busy,  and  in  earnest. 

I  went  round  the  room,  examining  the 
work,  and  politely  hoping  my  presence  did 
not  interrupt  it. 

"  Oh,  no !  madame  does  not  disturb  us  at 
all.  We  have  been  working^  ever  since  ei^ht 
this  morning.  We  are  glad  of  a  rest.  So 
is  Angela"  (the  model,  to  whom  they  all 


185  ^  PARIS  ATELIER 

seemed  very  kind).  "  We  have  the  draped 
model  in  forenoons,  the  nude  of  afternoons. 
Monsieur"  (naming  the  artist-head  of  the 
atelier)  'Ogives  us  instruction;  perhaps  two 
minutes  each,  but  we  learn  most  by  experi- 
ence and  practice,  and  by  criticising  one  an- 
other's work." 

This  work  seemed  to  me  much  above  the 
average.  A  little  rough,  perhaps,  being 
rapidly  done,  with  broad  effects  rather  than 
delicate  finishing;  but  there  was  nothing  of 
the  lady-amateur  about  it.  So  far  as  it  went 
it  was  real  Art.  The  model,  an  old  woman 
with  a  book  on  her  lap,  seemed  as  much  in- 
terested in  it  as  the  artists  themselves. 

^'She  is  a  good  old  soul — Angela — ^and 
she  sits  capitally,  but  none  of  us  can  speak 
much  to  her.  She  is  Italian."  At  wdiich  I 
w^ent  up  and  said  a  few  words  to  her  in  her 
own  tong;ue. 

The  old  woman,  who,  having  finished 
munching  her  crust,  was  just  settling  herself, 
steady  as  a  statue,  with  her  book  on  her  lap. 


A  PARIS  ATELIER.  187 

started  up,  her  two  black  eyes  gleaming, 
and  her  yellow,  leathery  face  growing  all  alive 
with  more  than  pleasure — ecstasy — "  The 
siguora  speaks  Italian  !  The  signora  is  go- 
ing direct  to  Kome !"  And  in  a  perfect  tor- 
rent of  Italian  Angela  poured  out  her  his- 
tory ;  how  she  was  over  eighty,  and  had  chil- 
dren and  grandchildren  in  Eome,  which  she 
had  left  four  years  ago,  and  only  hoped  she 
might  live  to  go  iDack  to  it  again.  ^'Eoma, 
bella  Koma!  And  the  signora  is  going 
there!  Soon  —  soon?"  added  she,  clasping 
her  skinny,  clawlike  fingers  on  my  arm,  and 
looking  at  me  with  a  passionate  pathos. 
Then,  seeing  the  circle  of  easels  already 
formed,  she  at  once  remounted  to  her  place, 
reopened  her  book,  and  was  again  the  mere 
model.     Poor  old  Anc^ela! 

There  are  other  models  at  the  atelier — 
women  only — as  the  students  are  exclusive- 
ly women.  But,  as  private  models  are  ex- 
pensive, the  young  ladies  often  sit  to  one  an- 
other. 


Igg  A  PARIS  ATELIER. 

"  If  you  will  come  home  with  me,"  said  the 
student  I  knew  best,  "  I  can  show  you  a 
portrait  which  w^e  all  think  extremely  good. 
We  hope  it  may  get  into  the  Salon.     Miss 

■ and  I  live  in  the  same  pension.    While 

painting  this  picture  she  found  she  w\as 
spending  her  money  too  fast,  so  w^ent  up 
higher  and  higher,  to  the  very  top  of  the  pen- 
sion. There  she  finished  it,  in  a  tiny  room 
you  could  scarcely  turn  round  in,  so  I  brought 
it  down  to  my  room  to  be  on  view." 

"  Dow^n  "  was  only  au  quatrieme^  and  "  my 
room"  not  more  than  twelve  feet  square; 
but  we  found  the  picture  a  very  clever  one. 
It  leaned  against  the  wall,  upon  the  brick 
floor,  wdiich  was  covered  by  a  scrap  or  two 
of  carpet. 

The  other  furniture  of  my  young  friend's 
"home," as  she  had  affectionately  called  ifc, 
consisted  of  a  bed,  a  table,  four  chairs,  and 
a  small  washing  -  stand  and  toilet  ap^^aratus. 
There  was  also  a  shelf,  whereon  stood  a  tea- 
pot, a  cup  and  saucer,  one  or  two  plates,  a 


A  PARIS  ATELIER.  189 

vase  with  primroses  and  ivy-leaves,  and  a 
second  saucer  filled  with  earth,  where  the 
tiniest  of  cowslip  roots  was  trying  to  put  out 
a  leaf  or  two. 

*^  I  hope  it  will  grow.  I  dug  it  up  in  our 
country  walk  last  Sunday,"  said  the  mistress 
of  the  place.  "  Yes,  when  I  light  the  fire  the 
room  is  very  cosey.  I  had  a  tea-party  of  six 
here  last  night.  When  we  give  tea-parties 
we  generally  bring  our  own  teacups  and 
chairs.  At  our  ])en%ion  we  are  all  very 
friendly,  being  chiefly  English  and  Ameri- 
cans. One  girl  is  lucky  enough  to  have  her 
mother  with  her,  the  rest  of  us  are  mostly 
alone.  As  you  say,  if  we  were  ill,  it  would 
be  rather  dreary,  but  we  seldom  are  ill;  we 
have  no  time  for  it.  If  we  were,  I  am  sure 
we  should  all  be  very  kind  to  one  another." 

I  asked  if  they  ever  made  acquaintance 
with  the  young  men  of  the  same  atelier,  or 
at  least  studying  under  the  same  artist. 

"No;  our  work  is  quite  separate.  We 
seldom  meet  them,  and  if  we  did,  we  are  too 


290  ^  PARIS  ATELIER. 

busy  for  any  nonsense.  Still,  we  girls  find 
amusement  in  our  own  quiet  way.  Now  and 
then  we  go  to  the  theatre,  when  we  can  afford 
it,  which  is  not  too  often.  But  you  must 
admire  the  portrait;  isn't  it  clever?  and  my 
view — the  two  towers  of  St.  Sulpice — which 
I  mean  to  paint  some  day.  And  look  at  my 
kettle  and  my  frying-pan,  and  my  two 
presses,  one  for  provisions,  the  other  fur 
clothes.  Yes,  indeed,  I  am  exceedingly  com- 
fortable." 

And  the  girl,  still  only  a  girl,  who  not 
long  before  had  been  a  rich  man's  daughter, 
surrounded  by  every  luxury,  stood,  with 
mingled  dignity  and  independence,  pointing 
out  all  the  good  things  she  had,  and  main- 
taining a  stoical  silence  on  what  she  had  not. 
A  common  story,  doubtless  only  too  com- 
mon in  that  atelier.  But  the  workinc:  w^om- 
an,  if  not  compelled  to  w^ork  too  late  in  life, 
has  a  far  happier  life  than  that  of  the  rich 
idler,  who  possesses  everything  and  enjoys 
nothins:. 


A  PARIS  ATELIER.  191 

However,  better  than  any  words  of  mine, 
will  be  what  one  of  these  girl -students  says 
herself,  in  some  notes  which  I  asked  her  to 
make  for  me.  I  give  them  just  as  they 
are. 

"For  any  girls  coming  to  study  art  in 
Paris,  to  live  as  we  do,  in  a  quiet  penstotij 
is  far  better  and  more  economical  than  to 
board  with  a  French  family,  unless  we  wish 
to  master  the  language.  Nothing  can  be 
more  simple  than  our  habits.  We  have  one 
room,  which  is  both  sitting-room  and  bed- 
room, and  we  descend  to  dinner  when  we 
choose,  not  otherwise.  We  cook  our  own 
breakfast  over  a  spirit-lamp  at  eight  a.m., 
and  go  straight  to  the  atelier,  where  we 
work  till  twelve.  Then  dejeuner,  and  work 
again  till  five  p.m.  Returning  to  our  peii- 
sion,  we  can  go  down  to  dinner  in  the  salle- 
a-manger  if  we  like,  but  more  often  we  boil 
our  own  kettle,  have  tea  and  an  ^.gg,  and 
spend  the  evening  over  a  book.  It  does 
sound  rather  a  monotonous  life  foi*  us,  and 


192  ^  PARIS  ATELIER. 

yet  we  all  find  it  so  very  attractive  that  the 
weeks  slip  Ly  only  too  fast. 

"  Even  the  regular  morning  walk  is  pleas- 
ant. At  this  hour  the  Quartier  Latin  is 
filled  with  street-sellers  wheelinsr  their  stalls 
about,  housewives  marketing  in  their  white 
caps,  and  little  children  in  black  pinafores 
being  taken  to  school  by  their  honne  or  gar- 
go7i ;  streams  of  men,  too,  on  their  way  to 
business,  a  newspaper  in  one  hand,  and  a  roll 
in  the  other.  Hard- working  Paris  is  waking 
up  to  its  daily  life. 

"Our  atelier  gives  us  every  opportunity 
for  the  study  of  character,  for  in  daily  work 
together  most  people's  natures  are  clearly 
displayed.  There  is  the  elderly  spinster, 
prevented  from  study  in  her  youth,  and  al- 
ways envying  the  younger  students  who 
have  their  life  before  them.  Beside  her  is 
a  patient  artist  who  has  been  toiling  for 
years  without  making  any  visible  progress, 
but  who  still  hopes  to  succeed  on-e  day. 
Another,  equally  industrious,  with  her  whole 


A  PARIS  ATELIER.  I93 

soul  in  ber  work,  scorns  such  a  small  thing 
as  outward  appearance,  and  her  dress,  once 
aesthetic,  looks  like  a  worn-out  o'ohe  de  chara- 
hre^  slowly  melting  into  a  bundle  of  rags. 

"But  a  fevv^,  who  combine  the  love  of 
fashion  with  the  love  of  art,  come  here  in 
costumes  more  suited  to  the  Champs  Elysees 
than  to  our  crowded  studio,  where  they  are 
always  in  serious  danger  of  rubbing  against 
the  palettes,  knocking  down  the  easels,  etc. 

"  Then,  of  course,  no  atelier  would  be  com- 
plete without  its  bore.  She  is  generally 
elderly,  and  makes  a  practice  of  coming  in 
late,  and  sitting  down  in  the  front  rank,  or 
before  it,  ingeniously  contriving  to  conceal 
the  model  from  the  view  of  earlier-comers, 
who  naturally  protest.  Then  the  obscuring 
easel  is  removed  by  its  owner  with  an  air 
of  long-suifering  politeness,  a  few  inches,  no 
more,  still  annoying  another  victim,  who,  de- 
spairing of  justice,  moves  away,  and  begins 
work  afresh,  leaving  the  bore  in  triumphant 
possession  of  the  best  place  in  the  room. 
9 


194  ^  PARIS  ATELIER. 

"We  have  some  interesting  groups  of 
friends.  One  pair  might  almost  rival  the 
Ladies  of  Llangollen.  For  seven  years  they 
have  never  been  separated,  and  seem  quite 
indispensable  to  each  other.  It  is  the  clever 
one  who  is  the  most  devoted,  who  carries 
the  canvas,  washes  the  brushes,  arranges  the 
easel,  and,  in  short,  does  everything  for  her 
companion. 

"But  companionship  is  one  of  the  pleas- 
antest  bits  of  our  student  life.  Our  frugal 
tea-parties  are  delightful.  The  hostess  boils 
the  kettle  and  sets  the  table,  and  we  all  sit 
round  the  fire  and  discuss  the  last  exhibi- 
tion, especially  our  own  professor's  work 
therein,  or  the  success  of  one  of  us  in  getting 
into  the  Salon,  which  is  held  as  a  universal 
triumph  to  all.  Conversation  never  flags, 
for  some  of  us  have  lived  at  the  ends  of  the 
earth,  and  can  describe  them  well ;  and  oth- 
ers are  political  spirits,  who  belong  to  a  de- 
bating society,  and  wish  to  reconstruct  the 
world  after  their  own  pattern,  which  the  rest 


A  PARIS  ATELIER  195 

good-naturedly  but  resolutely  disapprove. 
Then  where  to  spend  our  Sunday  afternoons 
is  always  an  important  consideration.  Near- 
ly always  we  go  out  of  town  by  road  or  rail, 
and  after  six  days  spent  in  the  atelier  and 
its  close  atmosphere,  reeking  with  oil  and 
turpentine,  the  smells,  sights,  and  sounds  of 
the  country  are  only  too  delightful. 

'^Such  are  our  pleasures;  but,  after  all, 
the  most  interesting  thing  is  our  work.  Ev- 
ery Monday  we  have  the  excitement  of  posing 
the  new  model.  We  begin  enthusiastically; 
but  on  Tuesday,  after  the  professor  has  wit- 
nessed our  drawings,  our  high  spirits  sink  a 
little.  Lower  still  they  get  on  Wednesday 
and  Thursday;  by  Friday,  when  the  second 
professor  comes,  they  are  usually  down  to 
zero.  Saturday  finds  us  in  deepest  despair, 
only  comforted  by  the  resolution  to  do  bet- 
ter next  week;  and  that  day  is  generally 
devoted  to  water  -  color,  or  pen  -  and  -  ink 
sketches,  or  portraits  of  some  picturesque 
fellow -student  —  usually  kept  as  a  souvenir 


190  A  PARIS  ATELIER. 

when  the  time  for  leaving  the  atelier  comes, 
and  the  girls  who  have  been  working  to- 
gether all  winter  go  their  several  ways — to 
meet  again,  when  and  where,  who  knows? 
Probably  never." 

But  still  they  have  done  good  work,  poor 
girls,  and  mingled  it  with  a  great  deal  of  in- 
nocent enjoyment.  And  though  Paris  is  not 
a  desirable  place  for  a  girl  to  live  and  study 
alone,  still  necessity  has  no  law,  and  in  com- 
munity is  much  safety.  These  young  students 
seem  to  go  through  the  ordeal  unscathed, 
and,  so  far  as  I  could  judge,  without  being 
unfemininized;  for  they  are  working  women, 
and,  as  they  honestly  say,  have  "  no  time " 
for  anything  but  work.  It  is  idleness  which 
breeds  the  follies,  or  worse  than  follies,  of 
many  young  people;  teaches  tliem  to  sub- 
stitute flirtation  for  love,  and  the  craving 
after  mere  admiration  for  that  devotedness 
which,  however  sad,  is  at  least  more  noble 
than  the  selfish  vanity  of  a  conquering  beau- 
ty.    The  busy  life  of  a  working  woman  may 


A  PARIS  ATELIER.  197 

harden  her  a  little,  but  it  is  not  likely  either 
to  degrade  or  deteriorate  her.  And  very 
often,  in  good  time, 

"  If  Love  comes,  be  will  enter 
And  soon  find  out  the  way."' 

But,  should  he  never  come,  she  learns  to  do 
without  him,  and  will  be  all  the  happier  and 
better  woman  for  having  put  her  life  to  use- 
ful account. 

Therefore,  as  a  help  to  the  many  girls  who 
must  work,  and  do  work,  I  have  given  this 
simple,  truthful,  and  faithful  picture  of  how 
they  work  in  a  Paris  atelier. 


KISS  AND  BE  FEIENDS, 

A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER. 

Part  I. — Dublin. 

Whither  should  we  go  ?  That  was  the 
question.    I  meekly  suggested  "  To  Ireland." 

Now,  "  she's  Irish "  has  long  been  my 
family's  tender  excuse  for  certain  failings  of 
mine,  which,  let  us  hope,  like  some  of  my 
poor  country's,  lean  to  virtue's  side.  Espe- 
cially a  foolish  habit  of  liking  to  be  happy 
rather  than  miserable ;  and  of  fraternizing 
and  sympathizing  with  my  fellow-creatures, 
believing  them  all  friends  till  I  find  them 
out  to  be  foes.  Also — is  this  Irish  too  ? — 
an  irresistible  impulse  to  say  a  good  word 
for  the  losing  side.  So  we  decided  to  follow 
the  Prince  of  Wales's  example,  and  his  foot- 
steps, to  that  forlorn  and  much-abused  land 
of  Hibernia. 


KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS.  199 

Our  English  friends  regarded  us  with  won- 
dering pity.  Whether  they  expected  us  to 
be  blown  up  with  dynamite,  or  shot  at  from 
behind  a  hedge,  I  cannot  tell,  but  they 
warned  us  of  a  cyclone  that  was  coming — 
whence  many  other  bad  things  for  poor  old 
Ireland  do  come — fi-om  America,  and  wished 
us  safe  back  with  impressive  earnestness. 

It  did  come,  that  cyclone.  We  heard  it 
howling  in  the  roofs  of  Chester  Cathedral, 
we  saw  it  shaking  the  apple-blossoms  in  the 
quaint  old  gardens  by  the  walls,  and  bend- 
ing the  trees  by  the  river-side;  finally,  we 
had  to  take  refusre  from  it  in  the  shelterinoj 
*'rows."  But  by  the  time  the  Wild  Irish- 
man  had  swept  us  through  the  pretty  Welsh 
country  to  Holyhead,  the  sun  shone  so 
bright,  and  the  steamer  looked  so  large  and 
steady,  that  we  felt  it  would  be  cowardly  to 
linger.  "Faint  heart  never  won,"  or  de- 
served to  win,  anything.  We  risked  the 
voyage  —  and  Ireland,  and  have  never  re- 
pented. 


200  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

Had  the  Princess  of  Wales  set  her  foot  on 
Kingstown  pier,  and  driven  through  Dublin 
streets  in  such  a  downpour  as  we  did,  she 
might  have  doubted  that  extraordinaiy  phys- 
iological fact,  "  Erin,  the  tear  and  the  smile 
in  thine  eyes."  For  it  was  no  accidental 
tear,  but  a  veritable  influenza.  Yet  not  an 
hour  afterwards,  when  the  warm  Irish  wel- 
come had  quite  neutralized  the  unkindness 
of  the  Irish  skies,  they  too  cleared,  and 
melted  into  the  most  lovely  sunset;  delicate 
aquamarine,  with  a  pale -yellow  glow,  such 
as  no  artist  could  paint,  and-*  very  few  ever 
see,  except  in  Ireland. 

But  the  cyclone  was  not  spent.  We  woke 
to  the  wettest  of  wet  Sundays,  which  mat- 
tered little,  as  I  had  resolved  to  spend  it  in 
St.  Patrick's  Cathedral,  of  which,  and  the 
music,  I  had  heard  so  much.  Not  untruly. 
Many  years  before  I  had  seen  it  in  its  mel- 
ancholy, neglected  decay,  before  it  was  "  re- 
built with  porter  bottles,"  as  Irish  wit  chron- 
icles its  munificent  restoration  by  one  of  the 


A  WUITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  201 

Guinness  family.  I  half  expected  to  find,  as 
often  happens,  that  restoration  had  been  ru- 
ination. But  it  was  not  so;  all  had  been 
done  in  excellent  taste.  And  as  to  the  mu- 
sic, even  after  having  heard  the  finest  cathe- 
dral services  in  England  and  France,  and  the 
various  funzioni  of  two  Easters  at  Eome,  I 
found  it  beautiful.  Beethoven's  "Hallelu- 
jah," from  the  "Mount  of  Olives,"  part  of 
Spohr's  "  Last  Judgment, "  and  Handel's 
"  Lift  up  your  heads,  O  ye  gates,"  were  given 
with  rare  perfection.  Indeed,  for  refinement 
and  even  balance  of  voices,  accuracy  and  pu- 
rity of  singing,  any  music  lover  would  find 
the  choir  of  St.  Patrick's  worth  crossing  the 
Channel  to  listen  to,  which  is  saying  a  good 
deal. 

And  as  for  the  sermons.  Irish  preaching 
is  popularly  supposed  to  be  "full  of  sound 
and  fury,  signifying  nothing."  But  Dean 
Reichel  has  added  depth  and  solidity  to  his 
native  force.  Brief,  terse,  vivid,  a  clear  skel- 
eton of  thouglit,  clothed  with  the  bone  and 
9* 


202  I^ISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

muscle  of  language — very  muscular  language 
too;  no  mincing  of  matters  in  the  smallest 
degree — the  two  sermons  we  heard  from  him 
that  Sunday  were  a  treat  to  listen  to.  Only, 
was  it  wise,  was  it  necessary,  in  a  semi-Cath- 
olic country,  while  explaining  his  own  inter- 
pretation of  the  mysterious  text,  Christ's 
preaching  "  to  the  spirits  in  prison,"  that  the 
dean  should  abuse  so  vehemently  the  doc- 
trine of  purgatory,  for  which  at  least  equal 
arguments  may  be  found  by  its  defenders? 
And  in  his  afternoon  discourse  upon  the 
text,  "  Remove  from  among  you  the  accursed 
thing" — which  was  listened  to  by  an  enor- 
mous and  dead -silent  crowd,  such  as  might 
have  gathered  under  Luther  or  Savonarola 
— could  not  the  preacher's  passionate  denun- 
ciations of  sin  have  been  followed  by  as  pas- 
sionate an  entreaty  to  sinners — "  Why  will 
ye  die,  O  House  of  Israel  ?" 

Can  any  human  soul  be  driven  out  of  hell 
and  into  heaven  with  a  cat  o'  nine  tails  ?  w^as 
ever  any  doctrine  enforced  wholesomely  by 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  203 

the  blows  of  a  sledge-hammer?  I  believe 
not.  Yet  unquestionably  it  was  a  most 
powerful  sermon.  And  when,  finally  de- 
scribing the  state  of  a  man,  God-forsaken,  in 
whom  conscience  itself  is  dead — which  the 
dean  held  to  be  the  mysterious  sin  against 
the  Holy  Ghost — he  lowered  his  voice  and 
said,  after  a  solemn  pause,  "  For  this  there  is 
no  repentance,  either  in  this  world  or  in  the 
world  to  come,"  the  hush  of  awed  silence 
which  came  over  the  dense  congregation  was 
something  never  to  be  forgotten. 

All  the  more  so  that  they  were,  I  grieve 
to  say,  by  no  means  a  well-behaved  con- 
gregation. Before  service  they  chattered, 
stared  about,  and  smiled  in  a  most  objec- 
tionable way.  Two  ladies  especially,  whose 
age  should  have  taught  them  better — I 
hope  they  will  read  this  paper  and  remem- 
ber the  indiejnant  rebuke  of  another  old 
lady,  who  hates  the  desecration,  by  chatter- 
ing, of  any  house  of  muvsic;  doubly  so  when 
it  is  also  the  house  of  God. 


204  ^ISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

Two  more  ladies  evoked  a  little  harmless 
moralizing.  One  was  a  regular  type  of  the 
"untidy  Irishwoman,"  her  handsome,  ill- 
made  sealskin  jacket  hanging  on  her  broad 
back  like  a  sack;  her  bonnet,  all  flowers, 
feathers,  and  jet  beads,  stuck  on  the  top  of 
a  mass  of  hair,  soft,  fine,  with  scarcely  a  gray 
thread  in  it,  but  looking  as  if  it  had  not  been 
combed  for  a  week.  Her  clothes  altogether 
seemed  to  have  been  "thrown  on  with  a 
pitchfork" — and  yet  her  large,  fat,  foolish 
face  wore  a  look  of  contented  enjoyment. 
Very  different  was  the  face  beside  her — 
clear-cut,  worn,  and  rather  sad,  the  silvery 
hair  laid  smoothly  over  the  forehead.  Her 
bonnet,  close  and  comfortable,  and  her 
mantle,  of  very  common  materials,  but  well- 
fitting,  neat,  and  whole,  completed  the  pict- 
ure of  the  "tidy  Irishwoman." — Some  of  the 
very  tidiest  women  I  have  ever  known  have 
been  Irishwomen!  I  speculated  on  these 
two,  and  thought  what  a  curse  one  must  be, 
and  what  a  blessing  the  other,  in  some  un- 
known home! 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER  205 

An  Irish  home !  Novelists  of  a  past  gen- 
eration— Miss  Edge  worth,  Lever,  Lover — 
have  painted  it  for  English  amusement,  pity, 
or  contempt.  And  more  than  one  modern 
writer,  notably  the  author  of  "Hogan,M.P.," 
has  done  the  same,  using  the  wonderful 
power  of  Irish  wit  and  Irish  pathos  to  make 
error  funny,  and  evoke  sympathy,  not  mere- 
ly with  sorrow,  but  w^ith  actual  sin.  All 
may  be  true  enough,  the  recklessness  and 
the  poverty,  the  outward  gaudiness  and  in- 
ward squaloi*.  But  is  Ireland  the  only  coun- 
try where  exists  that  miserable  habit  of  put- 
ting the  best  on  the  outside,  and  living  for 
show,  not  reality?  where  everything  is  al- 
lowed, morally  and  physically,  to  go  to  rack 
and  ruin  for  want  of  that  "  stitch  in  time  " 
which  "  saves  nine  " — that  systematic  order, 
economy,  punctuality,  which  form  the  very 
keystone  of  all  home  honor  and  home  hap- 
piness ? 

I  have  seen  in  wealthy  England  and 
prudent  Scotland  homes  which  answered  to 


206  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

this  wretched  picture,  and  in  Ireland  homes 
just  the  contrary.  Not  rich,  it  is  true — no- 
body is  rich  in  Ireland — but  where  a  noble 
economy  makes  all  needful  comforts  attain- 
able, where  to  dress  simply  and  live  care- 
fully are  things  neither  to  shrink  from  nor 
be  ashamed  of,  while  to  spend  time,  thought, 
and  all  available  money  upon  the  poor  and 
needy  is  a  self-sacrifice  so  natural  that  none 
regard  it  as  such ;  where  the  heads  of  the 
household  are  its  guides  and  helpers  as  well 
as  its  rulers,  and  the  servants  would  almost 
die  for  "  the  family ;"  where  Catholic  and 
Protestant  live  together  in  harmony,  the 
landlord  going  among  his  tenants,  needing 
no  protection  from  policeman  or  revolver, 
and  the  mistress  taking  her  rounds  of  charity 
at  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night,  as  safe  and 
as  honored  as  any  Catholic  nun.  I  am  paint- 
ing no  ideal  picture.  Such  homes  exist,  and 
while  they  do  there  is  hope  for  poor  old 
Ireland. 

But  to  our  wanderings.     We  seemed  des- 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  207 

tilled  to  end  them  in  despair.  Eain,  rain, 
nothing  but  rain.  It  swept  alike  down  the 
wide,  handsome  Dublin  streets  and  the  miser- 
able Dublin  slums,  where  the  prince  and  his 
son  won  everybody — as  we  heai'd  on  all 
sides — by  the  kindly  word  and  smile  which, 
to  the  warm  Irish  heart,  is  better  than  gold. 
One  expedition  we  made — to  Phoenix  Park 
— perhaps  the  finest,  as  it  is  much  the  largest, 
park  of  any  European  city.  We  looked  first 
at  the  Viceregal  Lodge,  hidden  in  its  trees, 
and  then,  within  sight  and  hearing  of  it,  at 
the  tiny  cross  marked  with  pebbles  in  the 
roadway,  which  records  one  of  the  darkest 
trao:edies  of  modern  times — the  murder  of 
Cavendish  and  Burke. 

Truly  our  English  nobles  must  have  some- 
thing intrinsically  noble  about  them  to  go 
about  day  by  day  face  to  face  with  possible 
death ;  for  months  the  lord-lieutenant  never 
stirred  out  without  a  military  escort,  each 
with  a  drawn  sword  in  his  hand  and  a  re- 
volver in  his  pocket    Why  should  be  leave 


208  ^ISS  ^^^  ^^  FRIENDS. 

his  safe;,  wealthy  home  and  easy  life,  if  not 
for  the  sake  of  duty?  No  one  can  look  in 
the  viceroy's  face,  so  full  of  care  and  yet  full 
of  kindness,  without  feeling  that  whatever 
the  disloyal  may  say,  it  is  the  face  of  an 
honest,  generous,  and  kindly  man.  His  ad- 
versaries should  at  least  give  him  the  benefit 
of  the  doubt. 

Despite  of  rain,  hail,  and  bitter  cold,  more 
like  January  than  the  near-approaching  June, 
we  determined  to  pursue  our  Whitsuntide 
wander.  It  is  the  heart,  not  the  weather, 
which  makes  the  holidav.  And  so  we  left 
Dublin,  and  started  for  a  country  place, 
where  our  welcome  was  sure. 

Ireland's  picturesqueness  lies  in  its  coast- 
scenery.  Its  centre  is  mostly  a  dead  level 
of  bog  or  pasture-land.  There  are  few  or 
none  of  the  smiling  harvest  fields  which 
make  England  so  pretty;  the  climate  refuses 
to  grow  cereals,  and,  alas !  the  people  have 
not  the  persistent  industry  required  for  cul- 
tivated farming.    Neat  hedgerows,  well-kept 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER  209 

woodlands,  good  roads,  and,  above  all,  the 
sweet,  contented-looking  villages  and  hamlets 
that  one  sees  continually  in  England,  must 
not  be  looked  for  here.  Yet  it  was  a  green 
and  pleasant  country  that  we  swept  through 
— no,  crawled  through — Irish  railways  al- 
ways crawl — and,  reaching  our  station  at 
last,  we  mounted  the  familiar  outside  car 
with  its  lively  Irish  pony.  Excellent  ani- 
mal !  that  day  he  did  forty  miles  in  sixteen 
hours. 

Does  any  one  know  how  delightful  it  is  to 
drive  across  country  in  an  outside  car,  with 
just  enough  necessity  for  holding  on  to  keep 
your  mind, amused,  and  just  enough  jolting 
and  shaking  to  give  you  "  the  least  taste  in 
life"  of  horse  exercise?  How  pleasant  to 
feel  the  wind  in  your  face,  and  see  the  rain- 
clouds  drifting  behind  you — to  catch  in  pass- 
ing the  sights  and  scents  of  moorland  gorse, 
of  ditch-bank  primroses,  and  hidden  hya- 
cinths, and  the  yellow  gleam  of  whole  acres 
of  cowslips !     I  never  did  see  so  many  cow- 


210  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

slips !  a  sign,  alas !  of  poor  laud.  When  the 
soil  improves  the  cowslips  disappear.  And 
for  birds — there  seemed  a  blackbird  in  every 
tall  tree,  and  a  dozen  larks  singing  madly 
over  every  bit  of  common. 

But  of  human  habitations  there  were  very 
few.  Now  and  then  a  group  of  little  Kerry 
cows — mostly  black — or  a  family  of  happy 
pigs,  often  black  too,  dotted  the  pastures, 
implying  another  family  close  by,  who  turned 
out  to  gaze  at  us  from  w^hat  might  be  either 
cabin  or  cow-shed,  or  both — half  clad  boys 
or  girls,  one  could  hardly  tell  which,  with 
wild  shocks  of  hair  and  splendid  Irish  eyes, 
full  of  fun  and  intelli^-ence.  And  sometimes 
we  passed  a  woman  with  a  shawl  over  her 
head,  Irish  fashion,  carrying  a  huge  bundle 
and  perhaps  a  child  as  well,  w^ho  looked  at 
us  an  instant,  then  looked  away.  Thin, 
poverty-pinched  faces  they  often  were,  but 
neither  coarse,  sullen,  nor  degraded,  nothing 
like  the  type  of  low  Irish  that  one  sees  in 
towns.     Much  to  be  pitied  truly,  but  cer- 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER  211 

tainly  not  to  be  despised.  Some,  perbaps, 
dropped  a  courtesy  to  "the  quality,"  but, 
generally,  they  just  looked  at  us  with  a  dull 
curiosity,  and  passed  on.  Little  enough  have 
"  the  quality  "  done  for  thera,  poor  souls ! 

Every  two  or  three  miles  we  came  upon 
handsome  lodge-gates  and  lodges,  marking 
the  entrance  to  beautiful  parks,  and  saw, 
gleaming  through  the  trees,  the  "  big  house," 
deserted  and  going  to  ruin.  Two  thirds  of 
the  landlords  in  this  county  are  absentees. 

"  Sometimes,"  we  were  told,  "  they  spend 
a  few  weeks  here — we  meet  them  at  dinner- 
parties, but  they  always  come  protected,  and 
very  often  it  is  only  the  ladies  of  the  family 
who  venture  out  at  all.  In  the  bad  times, 
generally  our  carriage  was  the  only  one  that 
was  waiting  without  a  policeman  on  it." 

What  a  picture!  Whose  fault  is  it? 
That  of  the  ignorant  masses,  or  the  educated 
aristocracy? — the  "fathers  and  mothers"  of 
the  land,  who  might  as  well  expect  to  bring 
up  their  children  "  with  a  kiss  and  a  blow," 


212  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

alternating  with  the  indifference  of  total  ab- 
sence, as  think  to  find  Ireland  a  prosperous 
country  when  landowners  thus  forsake  it. 

I  am  no  Home- ruler,  no  Parnellite.  I 
loathe  the  agitators  who,  chiefly  for  their 
own  ends,  and  for  the  love  of  excitement  and 
notoriety,  play  upon  the  affectionate,  impul- 
sive Irish  heart  to  its  destruction.  But  I 
own,  when  I  looked  at  these  grand  mansions, 
or  pleasant  country-houses,  slowly  dropping 
to  decay,  and  thought  of  what  such  are  in 
England — the  centre  of  that  educating  inter- 
course and  generous  sympathy  between  rich 
and  poor  which  is  an  inestimable  benefit  to 
both — I  felt  that  "the  finest  peasantry  on 
earth,"  as  I  once  heard  their  champion 
O'Connell  call  them,  have  a  good  deal  to 
complain  of. 

Not  all.  Not  in  that  oasis  of  the  desert, 
that  haven  of  peace  where  we  took  up  our 
brief  rest.  But  this  trenches  on  the  sanctity 
of  private  life,  so  I  will  pass  it  over. 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  213 

Part  IT. — Killarney. 

And  only  the  most  persistently  punctual 
of  people  could  ever  have  got  there!  To 
start  at  7.30  a.m.  from  a  brio-ht  breakfast- 
table,  drive  ten  Irish  miles  in  pouring  rain, 
and  wait  anxiously  at  a  small,  comfortless 
station,  where,  of  course,  the  train  was  late — 
and  it  took  a  frantic  struG^G^le  to  catch  the 
Killarney  train  at  all  —  was  an  expendi- 
ture of  more  courage  and  strength  than  one 
could  well  spare.  But  it  was  done.  And 
though  we  laughed  at  our  own  folly  in  call- 
ing this  a  "pleasure"  excursion,  and  repeated 
inwardly  the  old  Scotch  song, "  Why  left  I 
my  hame  f  —  (why,  indeed !)  still  there  we 
were,  and  we  must  make  the  best  of  it. 

We  did;  and  were  rewarded.  About 
Limerick  Junction  the  clouds  began  to  break, 
and  by  the  time  we  had  passed  through  the 
dull,  dreary,  level  country  which  lies  between 
it  and  Killarney,  the  skies  had  cleared,  and 
burst  into  that  passionate  mingling  of  storm 


214  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

aud  sunshine  which  is  the  charm  of  a  moun- 
tainous country,  especially  when  that  coun- 
try is  Ireland. 

Tourist  raptures  are  always  objectionable, 
but  when  one  has  seen  the  Swiss,  Italian, 
Scotch,  and  English  lakes  and  still  finds 
Killarney  lovely  —  there  must  be  something 
in  it.  "Lovely"  is  the  right  word  —  not 
grand,  or  startling,  or  gloomily  sublime,  but 
full  of  a  lovable  loveliness,  that  warms  and 
soothes  the  spirit  more  than  I  can  express. 
"When,  after  a  pleasant  walk,  through  masses 
of  yellow  gorse,  among  orchises  and  prin> 
roses,  and  under  avenues  of  stately  trees,  we 
sat  down  on  the  soft,  dry  sand  of  the  lake 
shore,  and  looked  across  at  the  Toomies  and 
Purple  Mountain — truly  purple,  of  the  deep- 
est hue  of  hills  after  rain — it  seemed  as  if  we 
had  left  the  world  behind  us  at  an  immeas- 
urable distance,  and  that  this  was  a  place 
where  all  life's  storms  would  cease, 

"  And  our  hearts,  like  thy  waters,  be  mingled  in  peace." 

And  yet  it  is  only  a  day  and  a  half^  easy 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  215 

journeying,  from  London !  Would  that  many 
a  tired  London-dweller,  needing  a  brief  re- 
pose, and  dreading  the  worry  and  discom- 
fort of  going  abroad,  would  try  it. 

There  are  three  excellent  hotels  at  Killar- 
ney.  The  Lake,  the  Eailway,  and  the  Vic- 
toria, which  latter  we  cliose,  as  it  was  farther 
out  of  the  town.  Nor  did  we  ever  regret 
our  choice. 

As  this  paper  is  meant  to  exemplify  its 
title,  and  as  nothing  makes  one  love  a  coun- 
try like  knowing  it,  also  because  the  simplest 
means  of  civilizing  a  country  is  to  plant  on 
it,  at  intervals,  comfortable  hotels,  where 
travellers  can  "  rest  and  be  thankful,"  as  at 
this  one  at  Killarney  —  I  do  not  hesitate  to 
say  a  good  w^ord  for  the  Victoria. 

It  is  built  on  Lord  Kenmare's  land,  and 
its  visitors  have  the  privilege  of  going  any- 
where about  the  Kenmare  grounds.  Beauti- 
ful architecturally  it  is  not.  Outside  it  looks 
something  like  a  barrack,  but  inside  its  ar- 
rangements are  admirable.    "  Most  un-Irish," 


216  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

sarcastic  Saxons  would  say,  in  its  order,  clean- 
liness, punctuality;  but  in  the  essentially 
Irish  qualities  of  kindliness,  politeness,  and 
pleasantness,  it  may  favorably  compare  with 
any  hostelry  we  ever  visited.  It  has,  too, 
most  of  its  resources  within  itself.  The  dear 
little  Kerry  cows  feeding  in  the  twilight 
fields  implied  milk,  cream,  and  butter  ad 
libitum  J  the  hens  clucking  at  early  dawn 
awoke  a  hope  of  new-laid  eggs;  and  we 
watched  our  future  dinner  carried  past 
the  windows  in  the  shape  of  an  enormous 
newly-caught  salmon.  Unpoetical  facts  these, 
but  they  greatly  add  to  the  advantages  of  a 
holiday  wander.  "We  shall  be  almost  as 
comfortable  as  at  home,"  said  we.  And  we 
were. 

We  had  only  two  days  to  "  do"  Killarney, 
so  we  set  about  it  systematically.  Day 
the  first  —  Tore  Waterfall,  Mucross  Abbey, 
and  woods,  the  middle  and  lower  lake  with 
its  islands.  Day  the  second  —  the  Gap  of 
Dunloe,  the  upper  lake,  the  Long  Eange,  and 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  217 

back  to  the  lower  lake,  on  whose  shore  was 
our  hotel.  This  programme  covered  most  of 
what  we  wished  to  see,  and  the  intelligent 
landlord  arranged  it  for  us  —  as  he  will 
for  any  tourist  —  with  cars,  boats,  boatmen, 
lunch,  everything  most  easy  and  compara- 
tively inexpensive,  for  there  was  no  bargain- 
insr  and  no  extortion. 

A  slight  shower  fell  as  we  drove  through 
Killarney  town,  with  its  shabby  dreariness, 
and  its  groups  of  idle  chatterers  standing  at 
street  corners.  Oh,  if  Irish  men — and  women 
— would  only  spend  in  working  the  time 
they  waste  in  talking,  what  a  different  coun- 
try theirs  might  be ! 

Tore  Waterfall  was — ^^vell !  not  grand,  but 
very  pretty.  And  Mucross  Abbey  was  like 
most  old  abbeys,  except  for  a  stately  yew- 
tree  in  the  cloisters,  which,  with  a  peculiarity 
rare  among  yew-trees,  had  refused  to  shoot 
out  a  single  branch  till  fairly  above  the  walls, 
and  then  spread  out  into  a  splendid  tree. 
An  omen,  may  it  be,  of  poor  old  Ireland,  if 
10 


218  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

•ever  she  can  attain  God's  free  air  and  liglit, 
unencumbered  by  prejudice  on  one  side  and 
superstition  on  the  other. 

Hope  seemed  to  dawn,  as  we  noticed  the 
exceeding  neatness  and  aspect  of  cultivation 
in  the  Mucross  property,  and  heard  what 
good  landlords  the  Herberts  were,  how  "the 
masther"  knew  every  tenant  on  his  estate, 
and  how  his  mother  and  sister  used  to  visit 
all  the  sick  and  poor.  And  though  he  was 
then  in  Amei'ica,  Mr.  Herbert  never  foi'got 
anybody,  and  everybody  looked  and  longed 
for  his  coming  back.  If  he  had  only  been 
there  wdien  the  princess  came !  and  could 
have  shown  her  the  old  abbey,  and  got 
her  to  plant  trees  as  the  queen  did  for  his 
fjithei*,  when  she  was  little  more  than  a  girl 
— six  flourishing  young  oaks,  that  promise 
to  last  a  thousand  years.  The  princess 
planted  nothing,  but  she  seemed  to  admire 
the  place  extremely.  "And  she  gave  me  a 
I'eal  gold  sovereign,  bless  her  purty  fi\ce !" 
added   the   guide.      Her  giving  it  herself 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  219 

seemed  to  toucli  his  old  heart  as  much  as 
the  sovereicrn. 

Everywhere  we  found  that  the  sweet  looks 
of  the  princess,  the  kindly  geniality  of  the 
prince,  had  left  a  vivid  impression;  and 
while  driving  through  Mucross  Woods,  and 
rowino:  to  the  Wine-cellars  and  the  Colleen 
Bawn  island,  where,  as  London  play -goers 
know,  Danny  Mann  tried  to  drown  Eily 
O'Connor,  it  was  pleasant  to  think  how 
our  royalties  must  have  enjoyed  it  all,  and 
how  it  possibly  taught  them  that  the  sad 
face  of  Ireland  could  be  made  to  smile.  And 
will — when  landowners  learn  to  live,  though 
never  so  simply  and  economically,  upon  their 
own  land  and  among  their  own  people,  in- 
stead of  leaving  their  tenantry  to  the  mercy 
of  any  mischievous  agitator,  who  tries  to 
persuade  them  that  all  their  misfortunes 
are  wrongs,  and  tliat  English  misgovernment 
is  at  the  bottom  of  it  all.  Possibly;  yet 
neither  a  human  being  nor  a  country  ever 
falls  under  the  curse  of  misgovernment  if  it 
knows  how  to  govern  itself. 


220  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

We  shared  in  the  universal  opinion  that 
the  best  thing  which  could  happen  to  Ire- 
land would  be  a  royal  residence,  such  as 
was  spoken  of  for  Prince  Albert  Victor,  and 
where,  if  he  imitates  his  parents  at  Sand- 
ringham,  his  example  would  prevent  more 
evil  and  do  more  good  than  any  Crimes  Act, 
for  it  would  shame  back  tlie  absentee  land- 
lords, cause  them  to  spend  in  Ireland  the 
money  now  w^asted  in  London,  Paris,  and 
Heaven  knows  where,  so  that  in  course  of 
years — the  evil  of  generations  cannot  be 
remedied  in  a  day — the  desert  might  rejoice 
and  blossom  as  the  rose. 

Killarney  does.  Though  decidedly  "  nat- 
ure with  her  hair  combed  " — it  is  combed 
so  skilfully  as  to  be  almost  imperceptible. 
The  magnolias,  hydrangeas,  and  eucalyptus 
trees,  and  especially  the  great  woods  of  self- 
sown  arbutus,  look  as  if  they  had  sprung  up 
of  their  own  accord.  AVe  glided  past  them 
softly  as  upon  a  summer  sea,  till  suddenly 
one  of  our  boatmen  threw  a  rug  over  us  to 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  221 

keep  out  the  spray,  and  then  we  found  our- 
selves tossing  like  a  cockle-shell  upon  waves 
which  needed  experienced  oarsmen  to  face 
at  all. 

It  is  often  so.  Sudden  storms  come  down 
from  the  mountains,  making  navigation  so 
riskv  that  sailino-'boats  are  never  allowed  on 
the  lakes  of  Killarney ;  but  the  boatmen  are 
equal  to  all  other  emergencies.  They  are  a 
very  fine  race;  our  two,  an  old  man  and  a 
young  one,  were  as  handsome  as  Venetian 
gondoliers,  and  as  courteous.  We  did  not 
wonder  that  the  stroke-oar  had  been  chosen 
to  row  the  piincess's  boat,  and  was  among 
the  fortunate  number  for  whom  the  prince 
had  left  twenty  pounds. 

Many  a  bit  of  pleasant  and  funny  gossip 
did  they  indulge  us  with  as  they  pulled  us 
into  smooth  water  and  landed  us,  nothing 
loath,  upon  "  sweet  Innisfallen,"  Moore's 
"  fairy  isle." 

It  is,  indeed,  a  fairy  isle.  That  May  even- 
ing, which  might  well  have  been  preceded 


222  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

by  the  lovely  May  morning  when  the  O'Don- 
ohue  rides  across  the  lake,  with  his  ghostly 
train — shall  we  ever  forget  it!  Beautiful 
Innisfallen !  in  its  total  solitude  and  silence, 
except  for  the  sheep  browsing  on  the  green 
turf,  and  the  thrushes  singing  in  the  great 
ash-trees,  what  a  dream  of  deliii^ht  it  was ! 
and  always  will  be — like  that  "bower  of 
roses  by  Bendemeer's  sti'eam."  For  we  all 
have,  or  have  had,  sonle  "calm  Bendemeer;" 
some  paradise,  realized  or  not,  where  the 
nightingales  sing  "all  the  day  long,"  and 
will  sing  until  the  brief  day  of  life  is  over 
and  done. 

Sweet  Innisfallen  !  the  old  monks  did 
well  to  set  up  their  rest  here.  In  the  time 
when  the  Angelus  was  rung,  and  the  mass 
was  sung,  in  these  now  ruined^  walls,  how 
civilizing,  if  nothing  more,  must  have  been 
the  influence  of  these  men,  who  kept  the 
flame  of  learning  alight  amid  pitchy  dark- 
ness and  did  such  exquisite  work  as  the 
Book   of  Kells,  ^vhich  we  saw  in  Trinity 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  223 

College,  Dublin  —  strange  remnant  of  so 
many  nameless,  long-forgotten  lives,  which 
yet  must  have  been  useful  in  their  gener- 
ation. 

As  I  took  the  bit  of  "  real  Irish  sham- 
rock" which  our  old  boatman  (who  remem- 
bered Daniel  O'Connell,  and  so  did  I) 
brought  me  as  a  votive  offering  from  In- 
nisfallen,  how  I  wished  that  when  orange 
despises  green,  and  Catholic  abhors  Protes- 
tant, both  parties  would  recall  the  fact  that 
they  spring  from  one  common  ancestor — the 
ancient  church,  which  for  several  hundred 
years  was  Ireland's  only  defence  against  to- 
tal barbarism. 

The  Gap  of  Dunloe  had  yet  to  be  done. 
It  was,  I  own,  rather  heavy  on  our  minds. 
Nine  miles  on  an  outside  car,  five  miles  on 
the  back  of  a  pony,  fourteen  miles  through 
the  lakes  in  a  boat,  were  a  serious  trial  to 
quiet  folk  decidedly  past  their  youth.  Had 
tlie  weather  been  doubtful  we  might  have 
meanly  shirked  the  expedition,  but  the  May 


224  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

morning  rose  gloriously ;  we  could  but  wish 
ourselves  well  through  the  day,  and  start. 

An  intelligent  American  at  the  tahle  dlwte 
— many  Americans  take  Killarney  en  Toute 
from  Queenstown — warned  us  of  the  nui- 
sance of  beggars.  And,  sure  enough,  as  soon 
as  we  reached  Kate  Kearney's  cottage — that 
lovely  young  woman  "  who  lived  by  the 
banks  of  Killarney"  has  much  to  answer 
for! — they  bore  down  upon  us  in  shoals, 
offering  stockings,  milk,  "  potheen,"  and  tben 
entreating  shillings  and  sixpences  with  the 
most  shameless  persistency;  for  they  were 
not  ragged  beggars,  but  very  respectably 
clad.  It  was  easy  to  believe  the  American's 
story,  that  yesterday,  when  he  said  he  had 
not  got  a  sixpence,  they  offered  to  change 
his  half  sovereis^n ! 

Determined  to  be  rid  of  them,  I  tried  first 
moral  suasion,  which  signally  failed,  then  a 
volley  of  rapid  French,  which  so  amazed 
them  that  they  retired  for  the  moment;  then 
to  a  woman,  who  had  run  after  the  ponies 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  225 

for  about  half  a  mile,  an  indignant  reproach, 
"  I  am  Irish,  and  you  make  me  ashamed  of 
my  country.  What  would  my  husband  say 
to  me  if  I  went  gadding  about  like  this,  in- 
stead of  doing  my  work  in-doors  ?  Go  home, 
and  do  your  work." 

"  'Deed,  ma'am,  and  maybe  you're  right," 
was  the  good-humored  answer,  and  whether 
from  conviction,  or  because  they  saw  no 
chance  of  getting  out  of  me  a  single  half- 
penny, the  beggars  stopped.  But  as  long 
as  silly  tourists  amuse  themselves  with  the 
weaknesses  of  the  lazy  Celtic  nature,  so  long 
will  Irish  beggars  exist,  to  the  disgrace  of 
themselves  and  their  patrons,  who  first  en- 
courage and  then  abuse  them. 

The  Gap  is  fine,  though  not  finer  than 
many  a  Scottish  glen ;  but  the  upper  lake  is 
very  picturesque,  and  the  Long  Range,  a 
river  ^xe  miles  long,  into  which  you  pass  by 
an  all  but  invisible  outlet,  is  most  beautiful. 
It  ends  at  the  old  Weir  Bridge,  in  a  rapid 
which  is  shot  so  skilfully  that   you  never 


226  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

notice  the  clanger  till  it  is  past;  yet  a  few 
inches  of  swerving  on  either  side,  and  the 
boat  would  be  dashed  to  pieces,  and  the 
strongest  swimmer  whirled  hopelessly  in 
the  current,  as  has  more  than  once  hap- 
pened. When  the  prince  was  here,  they 
told  us,  he  was  entreated  to  get  out  and 
walk  past  the  rapids;  it  would,  indeed,  have 
been  a  woful  catastrophe  for  the  future  king 
of  England  to  be  drowned  at  Killarney. 

He  must  have  seen  a  good  deal,  and 
thought  it  over  a  good  deal — our  sensible, 
practical,  kindly  Prince  of  Wales  —  but  I 
doubt  if  he  ever  saw  a  sis^ht  like  that  which 
met  our  eyes  next  morning  when,  after  look- 
ins^  our  last  on  the  lake  with  a  sore  heart, 
and  thinking  how  sad  more  hearts  must  be 
who  have  to  leave  "the  sod"  forever,  we 
found  the  station  filled  with  a  croAvd  of  peo- 
ple, come  to  bid  good-bye  to  some  emigrants, 
bound  to  Queenstown  by  the  same  train  as 
the  one  by  which  we  were  just  leaving  Kil- 
larney. 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  227 

Those  departing  Avere  chiefly  women,  a 
dozen  or  so,  probably  sent  for  by  their 
friends;  the  amount  of  money  which  reaches 
Ireland  yearly,  to  bring  out  friends  and 
kindred  to  America,  is,  we  were  told,  enor- 
mous. They  all  seemed  tolerably  cheerful, 
and  were  extremely  well-dressed — in  fashion- 
able jackets,  hats,  earrings,  and,  above  all, 
new  kid  gloves,  with  which  they  shook  the 
bare,  rough  hands  of  everybody  they  came 
near.  But  the  friends  had  the  ordinary  dress 
of  the  south  of  Ireland  peasant,  with  shawl  or 
cloak  drawn  over  their  heads ;  many  of  the 
faces,  men's  as  well  as  women's,  were  swollen 
with  crying,  and  every  few  minutes  some  one 
or  other  fell  on  the  necks  of  the  emigrants, 
sobbing  broken-heartedly. 

The  Saxon  nature  never  can  understand 
the  unrestrained  emotion  of  the  Irish,  who 
weep,  not  silently,  but  out  loud,  like  children. 
Hodge,  now,  would  have  said  good-bye  with 
a  sh^ke  of  the  hand,  or,  perhaps,  one  shame- 
faced kiss,  and  so  parted  in  the  most  com- 


228  ^ISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

monplace  way  —  forever.  But  Paddy  wails 
aloud,  and  never  thinks  of  hiding  his  poor 
tear-trodden  face.  His  quick  sympathies  ex- 
tend far  and  wide ;  for  miles,  at  every  cot- 
tage whence  the  train  was  visible,  stood 
groups  waving  some  poor  rag  of  a  handker- 
chief And  the  platform  of  Killarney  Station 
was  literally  crammed. 

What  stories  one  mi^-ht  have  imaojined! 
There  was  one  farmer -looking  lad,  who,  hid 
in  a  corner  with  his  lass,  was  beseeching  her 
to  be  faithful ;  the  tears  ran  down  his  cheeks 
in  streams,  but  hers  were  quite  dry,  and  she 
seemed  much  occupied  with  her  brown  vel- 
veteen "costume"  dress,  and  her  hat  covered 
with  spangles :  I  have  my  doubts  as  to  that 
young  woman's  fidelity.  There  was  only 
one  family  group — a  woman,  carrying  a  huge 
bundle  on  one  arm  and  a  baby  on  the  other, 
while  an  elder  boy  staggered  under  a  little 
sister,  scarcely  smaller  than  himself  The 
mother  had  a  quiet,  sad,  determined  face, 
and,  with  her  shawl  over  her  head,  might 
have  sat  for  a  Mater  Dolorosa. 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  229 

Indeed,  the  whole  type  of  face  among 
these  poor  people  was  very  fine,  indicating 
infinite  possibilities  for  the  race.  Nor  was 
there  any  squalid  poverty  or  actual  dirt. 
The  young  men  were  stalwart,  honest-look- 
ing fellows,  and  the  girls  had  a  decency  and 
modesty  of  manner  which  not  all  their  exu- 
berant grief  could  take  away.  Watching 
them,  I  quite  believed  what  I  had  lately 
been  told  by  one  who  had  had  large  ex- 
perience among  the  Irish  poor,  that,  as  is 
proved  by  the  registrar's  records,  the  Irish 
girl's  standard  of  moral  purity  is  far  high- 
er than  that  of  her  Scottish  or  Ens^lish 
sisters. 

True,  in  Ireland  there  are  no  end  of  early, 
imprudent  mari'iages,  boys  and  girls  scarce- 
ly out  of  their  teens  hastening  to  flood  the 
country  with  helpless  little  paupers;  but 
they  are  virtuous  and  healthy  paupers,  far 
less  harmful  than  those  wretched  abortions 
of  vice  and  misery  which  we  see,  not  only  in 
our  town  streets,  but  in  our  agricultural  dis- 


230  I^ISS  AND   BE  FRIENDS. 

tricts.  These  hapless  Irish  peasants  who, 
thouG-h  starving:  in  miserable  mud  cabins, 
manage  to  lead  pure  lives,  keep  the  rash 
marriage -tie  unbroken,  and  bring  up  their 
girls  and  boys  as  honest  as  themselves,  might 
they  not  be  made  into  the  strength  and  de- 
fence of  the  country,  instead  of  being  drained 
out  of  it,  carrying  its  best  blood  to  enrich 
another  land? 

In  truth,  the  saddest  thing  to  see  in  Ire- 
land is  the  enormous  waste  of  valuable  ma- 
terial, and  the  misapplication  of  it  to  base 
uses.  Many  a  worse  man  than  that  half- 
civilized  savage,  Myles  Joyce  of  Maani- 
trassma,  may  live  unhung;  and  perhaps 
more  than  one  of  those  poor  fellows,  for 
whom  wives  and  mothers  knelt  praying  out- 
side Kilmainham  Jail,  while  the  black  flag 
was  floating?  inside  it,  mio:ht  have  been  an 
honest,  good  fellow  at  heart,  and  died  in  his 
bed,  a  decent,  valuable  citizen,  if  only  he  had 
not  been  exposed  to  those  malific  influences 
which  are  always  at  work  in  Ireland,  and 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  231 

which  to  the  impressionable  Celtic  nature 
are  especially  dangerous. 

Irishmen  are,  in  their  good  points  and 
their  bad,  exceedingly  like  children;  and 
they  need  to  be  guided  and  governed  like 
children  ;  but  it  should  be  the  loving  control 
of  a  parent,  not  the  despotic  rule  of  a  hard 
taskmaster,  as  has  so  often  been  the  case. 
And,  above  all,  they  should  be  taught — woe 
betide  all  parents  if  they  do  not  teach  this 
to  their  children ! — to  control  and  govern 
themselves.  May  Ireland's  future  ruler,  who 
has  lately  seen  with  his  own  honest,  parental 
eyes  of  what  it  is  capable,  lay  this  maxim  to 
heart ! 

I  may  be  accused  of  painting  couleur  de 
rose,  but  I  do  so  intentionally.  There  are 
enough  writers  ready  to  put  into  the  picture 
the  very  blackest  hues,  or  worse,  those  glar- 
ing eccentric  colors  that  are  at  once  so  funny 
and  so  Mse.  I  know  all  Ireland's  faults; 
the  laugh  which,  God  help  the  poor  souls ! 
is  heard  in  the  midst  of  misery,  and  gives 


032  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

the  impression  that  this  misery  is  iinfelt; 
the  reckless  improvidence,  the  almost  child- 
ish habit  of  lying,  for  it  is  often  more  like 
puerile  imaginativeness  than  deliberate  un- 
truth ;  the  vehement  prejudices,  the  ridicu- 
lous pride,  and  love  of  outside  show,  which 
lias  ruined  thousands  of  families.  But  I  also 
know  Ireland's  virtues ;  its  strong  purity, 
its  stanch  fidelity,  its  quiet  endurance  of 
liard  fortunes,  its  self-respect  and  self  denial. 
The  possibilities  of  good  in  it  are  infinitely 
greater  than  its  proclivities  to  what  is  bad. 
If  any  happy  future  is  to  come,  the  reform 
ought  to  be  social,  not  political,  and  to  spring 
from  the  upper,  not  the  lower  class.  The 
Prince  of  Wales's  visit  has  done  more  to  turn 
the  heart  of  Ireland  towards  England  than 
all  the  legislation  of  the  last  twenty  years. 
Why  should  not  the  heart  of  England  turn 
towards  Ireland  ?  Why  should  not  tourists 
go  and  investigate  it,  and  by  demand  create 
supply,  so  as  to  bring  English  gold  into  its 
poverty-stricken  districts  ?     Nay,  might  not 


A  WHITSUNTIDE  WANDER.  233 

adventurous  capitalists  risk  a  little,  both  in 
coin  and  comfort,  by  buying  land  there  and 
starting  some  useful  industries?  The  great 
complaint  of  the  people  is  that  there  is  abso- 
lutely no  work  to  do.  They  are  obliged  to 
leave  their  country,  because  if  they  stayed  in 
it  they  would  starve.  Why  not  keep  them 
there — they  are  safer  in  Ireland  than  in 
America — by  offering  them  the  practical, 
sisterly  help  of  wealthy,  orderly,  industrious 
England,  given  in  a  kindly  way,  with  a  cool 
head,  warm  heart,  and  wisely  open  hand  ? 

In  the  hope  of  this,  a  day  which  we  may 
never  see,  but  perhaps  our  children  may,  I 
have  written  ray  paper,  and  called  it  "  Kiss 
and  be  Friends."  I  end  it  with  a  few  words 
of  advice  to  Protestants  and  Catholics,  Gov- 
ernment Officials,  and  Home-rulers,  Nation- 
alists, Conservatives,  Fenians,  Parnellites, 
and  the  whole  set  of  demagogues,  small  and 
great,  who  trade  upon  both  the  vices  and 
the  virtues  of  the  Ii'ish  character.  Those 
words   are   written   by  their   own   Tommy 


234  KISS  AND  BE  FRIENDS. 

Moore,  who,  amidst  all  his  foolishness,  some- 
times said  a  wise  thing  or  two,  and.  Irish- 
like, always  said  it  in  the  most  charming 
way : 

"Erin,  tliy  silent  tear  never  shall  cease, 
Erin,  tliy  languid  smile  ne'er  shall  increase, 
Till  like  the  rainbow's  light, 
Thy  various  tints  unite. 
And  form  in  Heaven's  sight 
One  arch  of  peace." 


THE  END. 


CONSTANCE  F.  WOOLSON'S  NOVELS. 


EAST  ANGELS.     16mo,  Cloth,  $1  25. 

ANNE.     Illustrated.     16mo,  Cloth,  U  25. 

FOR  THE  MAJOR.    16mo,  Cloth,  $1  00. 

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There  is  a  certain  bright  cheerfulness  in  Miss  Woolson's  writing  which 
invests  all  her  characters  with  lovable  qualities. — Jewisli  Advocate^  N.  Y. 

Miss  Woolson  is  among  our  few  successful  writers  of  interesting  mag- 
azine stories,  and  her  skill  and  power  are  perceptible  in  the  delineation  of 
her  heroines  no  less  than  in  the  suggestive  pictures  of  local  life. — Jewish 
Messenger,  N.  Y. 

Constance  Fenimore  Woolson  may  easily  become  the  novelist  laureate. 
— Boston  Globe. 

Miss  Woolson  has  a  graceful  fancy,  a  ready  wit,  a  polished  style,  and 
conspicuous  dramatic  power;  while  her  skill  in  the  development  of  a 
story  is  very  remarkable. — London  Life. 

Miss  Woolson  never  once  follows  the  beaten  track  of  the  orthodox  nov- 
elist, but  strikes  a  new  and  richly  loaded  vein  which,  so  far,  43  all  her 
own ;  and  thus  we  feel,  on  reading  one  of  her  works,  a  fresh  sensation, 
and  we  put  down  the  book  with  a  sigh  to  think  our  pleasant  task  of  read- 
ing it  is  finished.  The  author's  lines  must  have  fallen  to  her  in  very 
pleasant  places  ;  or  she  has,  perhaps,  within  herself  the  wealth  of  woman- 
ly love  and  tenderness  she  pours  so  freely  into  all  she  writes.  Such  books 
as  hers  do  much  to  elevate  the  moral  tone  of  the  day — a  quality  sadly 
wanting  in  novels  of  the  time. —  Whitehall  Review,  London. 


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Her  novels  are  replete  with  dramatic  incident;  the  style  is  clear  and 
simple  narration,  with  true  insight  into  character. — Brookipi  Times. 

"  The  Catskill  Fairies  "  is  a  really  charming  collection  of  little  stories, 
in  which  an  attempt,  and  a  successful  one  at  that,  is  made  to  open  up  a 
vein  of  national  fairy  lore.  There  are  twelve' stories  in  all,  told  with 
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not  only  fine  in  drawing  and  rich  in  effect,  but  they  abound  in  character, 
thought,  and  originality. — Saturday  Evening  Gazette,  Boston. 

One  of  the  most  exquisitely  appropriate  volumes  for  the  young  that 
could  be  devised — exquisite  in  its  paper,  binding,  typography,  and  illus- 
trations, and  equally  so  in  the  graceful,  eventful,  half- mysterious  tales 
which  it  contains.  Miss  Johnson  tells  a  fairy  story  to  perfection — as  if 
Bhe  believed  it  herself — and  with  a  wealth  of  tricksome  and  frolic  fancy 
that  will  delight  the  young  and  old  alike.  .  .  .  Nor  could  anything  be  de- 
vised more  apposite  to  the  holidays,  or  more  appropriate  for  a  gift,  than 
this  charming  book. —  Christian.  Intelligencer,  N.  Y. 

It  is  handriome  in  make-up,  is  beautifully  illustrated,  and  is  as  interest- 
ing as  could  be  desired.  .  .  .  Miss  Johnson  evidently  understands  juvenile 
literary  needs. — Brooklyn  Eagle. 


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WILL  CARLETOFS  POETICAL  WORKS. 


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which  lies  near  to  the  pathetic,  and  is  at  once  softening  and  strengthening 
in  its  influences.  There  is  something  veiy  genial  and  unaffected  in  all 
these  ballads. — Christian  Intellif/enccr,  N.  Y. 

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mor, the  wit  and  wisdom,  of  his  sojigs  are  of  the  sort  tliat  appeals  to  the 
emotions,  and  every  one,  whatever  his  station  or  knowledge  of  the  scenes 
with  which  they  deal,  can  recognize  their  faithful,  hearty  eloquence. — 
Boston  Traveller. 

YOUNG  FOLKS'  CENTENNIAL  KHYMES.    By 

Will  Carletox.     Illustrated,     pp.  124.     Post  Svo, 
Cloth,  $1  50. 

Homely  Revolutionary  incidents  done  into  easily  flowing  verse,  and  can- 
not fail  to  please  and  profit  the  boys  and  girls  for  whose  benefit  they  have 
been  written. — iV.  Y.  Evening  Post. 


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OATS  OR  WILD  OATSf 


Common-sense  for  Young  Men.   By  J.  M.  Buckley,  LL.D. 

pp.  xiv.,  306.     12rao,  Clotb,  |1  50. 

It  is  a  good  book,  which  ought  to  do  good  on  a  large  scale.  .  .  .  Such 
passages  as  those  headed  Tact,  Observation,  Reflection,  Self-command,  and 
tlic  like,  may  be  read  and  re-read  many  times  with  advantage. — Brooklyn 
Union. 

A  book  which  should  be  recommended  to  the  consideration  of  every 
young  man  who  is  preparing  to  go  into  a  business  career  or  any  other  iu 
which  he  may  aspire  to  become  an  honorable,  useful,  and  prosperous  citi- 
zen. ...  Dr.  Buckley  knows  the  trials  and  the  temptations  to  which 
young  men  are  exposed,  and  his  book,  while  written  in  most  agreeable 
iiinguage,  is  full  of  excellent  counsel,  and  illustrations  arc  given  by  an- 
ecdotes and  by  examples  which  the  author  has  observed  or  heard  of  in 
his  own  experience.  Besides  general  advice,  there  are  especial  chapters 
relating  to  professional,  commercial,  and  other  occupations.  So  good  a 
book  should  be  widely  distributed,  and  it  will  tell  on  the  next  generation. 
— Philadelphia  Bulletin. 

It  is  a  model  manual,  and  will  be  as  interesting  to  a  bright,  go-ahead 
boy  as  a  novel. — Philadelphia  Record. 

The  scheme  of  the  book  is  to  assist  young  men  in  the  choice  of  a 
profession  or  life  pursuit  by  explaining  the  leading  principles  and  char- 
acteristics of  different  branches  of  business,  so  that  the  reader  may  see 
what  his  experiences  are  likely  to  be,  and  thus  be  enabled  to  make  an 
intelligent  selection  among  the  many  avenues  of  labor.  In  order  to  make 
liis  work  accurate  and  comprehensive.  Dr.  Buckley  has  consulted  mer- 
chants, lawj'crs,  statesmen,  farmers,  manufacturers,  men  in  all  walks  of 
life,  and  specialists  of  every  description,  visiting  and  examining  their  es- 
tablishments, offices,  and  studios.  From  the  knowledge  thus  gained  he 
has  prepared  the  greater  part  of  his  book  The  remainder  is  given  to 
general  advice,  and  contains  the  old  maxims  familiar  to  all  young  men 
from  the  time  of  Poor  Richard.  Success  is  won  by  good  behavior,  intelli- 
gence, and  industry.  These  are  the  "  Oats."  The  "  Wild  Oats  "  of  lazi- 
ness, carelessness,  and  dissipation  bring  ruin,  disaster,  and  misery.  The 
Avork  is  likely  to  attract  readers  fiom  its  practical  value  as  a  compendium 
of  facts  relating  to  the  various  departments  of  labor  rather  than  on  ac- 
count of  its  moral  injunctions.  It  cannot  help  being  very  useful  to  the 
class  of  young  men  for  whom  it  is  intended,  as  also  to  parents  who  have 
boys  to  start  out  into  the  world. — N.  Y.  Times, 


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BOOTS  AND  SADDLES; 

Or,  Life  in  Dakota  with  General  Custer.  By  Mrs.  Eliz- 
abeth B.  Custer.  With  Portrait  of  General  Custer, 
pp.  312.     12nio,  Cloth,  $1  50. 

A  book  of  adventure  is  interesting  readinj:^,  especially  when  it  is  all  true, 
as  is  the  case  with  "  Boots  and  Saddles,"  *  *  *  She  does  not  obtrude  the 
fact  that  sunshine  and  solace  went  with  her  to  tent  and  fort,  but  it  in- 
heres in  her  narrative  none  the  less,  and  as  a  consequence  "  these  simple 
annals  of  our  daily  life,"  as  she  calls  them,  are  never  dull  nor  uninterest- 
ing.— Evangelut^  N.  Y. 

Mrs.  Custer's  book  is  in  reality  a  bright  and  sunny  sketch  of  the  life 
of  her  late  husband,  who  fell  at  the  battle  of  "Little  Big  Horn."*** 
After  the  war,  when  General  Custer  was  sent  to  the  Indian  frontier,  his 
wife  was  of  the  part}',  and  she  is  able  to  give  the  minute  story  of  her 
husband's  varied  career,  since  she  was  almost  always  near  the  scene  of 
his  adventures. — Brooklyn  Union. 

We  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  no  better  or  more  satisfactory  life 
of  General  Custer  could  have  been  written.  Indeed,  we  may  as  well 
speak  the  thought  that  is  in  us,  and  say  plainly  that  we  know  of  no  bio- 
graphical  work  anywhere  which  we  count  better  than  this.  *  *  *  Surely  the 
record  of  such  experiences  as  these  will  be  read  with  that  keen  interest 
which  attaches  only  to  strenuous  human  doings ;  as  surely  we  are  right 
in  saying  that  such  a  story  of  truth  and  heroism  as  that  here  told  will 
take  a  deeper  hold  upon  the  popular  mind  and  heart  than  any  work  of 
fiction  can.  For  the  rest,  the  narrative  is  as  vivacious  and  as  lightly  and 
trippingly  given  as  that  of  any  novel.  It  is  enriched  in  every  chapter  with 
illustrative  anecdotes  and  incidents,  and  here  and  there  a  little  life  story 
of  pathetic  interest  is  told  as  an  episode. — N.  Y.  Commercial  Advertiser. 

It  is  a  plain,  straightforward  story  of  the  author's  life  on  the  plains  of 
Dakota.  Every  member  of  a  "Western  garrison  will  want  to  read  this 
book ;  every  person  in  the  East  who  is  interested  in  Western  life  will 
want  to  read  it,  too ;  and  every  boy  or  girl  who  has  a  healthy  appetite 
for  adventure  will  be  sure  to  get  it.  It  is  bound  to  have  an  army  of  read- 
ers that  few  authors  can  expect. — Philaddphia  Preas. 

These  annals  of  daily  life  in  the  army  arc  simple,  yet  interesting,  and 
underneath  all  is  discerned  the  love  of  a  true  woman  ready  for  any  sacri- 
fice. She  touches  on  themes  little  canvassed  by  the  civilian,  and  makes  a 
volume  equally  redolent  of  a  loving  devotion  to  an  honored  husband,  and 
attractive  as  a  picture  of  necessary  duty  by  the  soldier. —  Commonweallh^ 
Boston.  

Published  by  HARPER  <k  BROTHERS,  N.  Y. 

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BEN-IIUR:  A  TALE  OF  THE  CIIUIST. 


By  LeWo  AYallacEo    Kew  Edition,     pp.  552.     I61110, 
Cloth,  $1  50. 

Anything  so  startling,  new,  and  distinctive  as  the  leading  feature  of  this 
romance  does  not  often  appear  in  works  of  fiction.  .  .  .  Some  of  Mr.  Wal- 
lace's  writing  is  remarkable  for  its  pathetic  eloquence.  The  scenes  de- 
scribed in  the  New  Testament  are  rewritten  with  the  power  and  skill  of 
an  accomplished  master  of  style. — iV.  Y.  Times. 

Its  real  basis  is  a  description  of  the  life  of  the  Jews  and  Romans  at  the 
beginning  of  the  Christian  era,  and  this  is  both  forcible  and  brilliant.  .  .  . 
We  are  carried  through  a  surprising  variety  of  scenes ;  we  witness  a  sea- 
fight,  a  chariot-race,  the  internal  economy  of  a  Roman  galley,  domestic  in- 
teriors at  Antioch,  at  Jerusalem,  and  among  the  tribes  of  the  desert;  pal- 
aces, prisons,  the  haunts  of  dissipated  Roman  youth,  the  houses  of  pious 
families  of  Israel.  There  is  plenty  of  exciting  incident;  everything  is 
animated,  vivid,  and  glowing. — N.  Y.  I'ribune. 

From  the  opening  of  the  volume  to  the  very  close  the  reader's  interest 
will  be  kept  at  the  highest  pitch,  and  the  novel  will  be  pronounced  by  all 
one  of  the  greatest  novels  of  the  day, — Boston  Post. 

It  is  full  of  poetic  beauty,  as  though  born  of  an  Eastern  sage,  and  there 
is  sufficient  of  Oriental  customs,  geography,  nomenclature,  etc.,  to  greatly 
strengthen  the  semblance. — Boston  CommoniceaUh. 

"  Ben-IIur "  is  interesting,  and  its  characterization  is  fine  and  strong. 
Meanwhile  it  evinces  careful  study  of  the  period  in  which  the  scene  is  laid, 
and  will  help  those  who  read  it  with  reasonable  attention  to  realize  the 
nature  and  conditions  of  Hebrew  life  in  Jerusalem  and  Roman  life  at 
Antioch  at  the  time  of  our  Saviour's  advent. — Examiner,  N.  Y. 

It  is  really  Scripture  history  of  Christ's  time  clothed  gracefully  and 
delicately  in  the  flowing  and  loose  drapery  of  modern  fiction.  .  .  .  Few  late 
works  of  fiction  excel  it  in  genuine  ability  and  interest. — iV.  Y.  Graphic. 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  and  delightful  books.  It  is  as  real  and 
warm  as  life  itself,  and  as  attractive  as  the  grandest  and  most  lieroic 
chapters  of  history. — Indianapolis  Journal. 

The  book  is  one  of  unquestionable  power,  and  will  be  read  with  un- 
wonted interest  by  many  readers  who  are  weary  of  the  conventional  novel 
and  romance. — Boston  Journal. 


TuBLisHED  BY  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York. 

JBS"  The  above  work  sent  by  mail,  postage  prepaid,  to  any  part  of  the  United  States 
or  Canada,  on  receipt  of  the  price. 


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U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


